"Where?"
"To a far country, perhaps."
"Will he come back?"
"No."
"Did he want to go?"
"We'll hope so."
"But he left his—his fur coat behind him. Didn't he need—that?"
"No, or he'd have taken it with him."
David had fallen silent at this. He had remained strangely silent indeed for some days; then, out in the woods with his father one morning, he gave a joyous shout. He was standing by the ice-covered brook, and looking at a little black hole through which the hurrying water could be plainly seen.
"Daddy, oh, daddy, I know now how it is, about being—dead."