‘The music stopped and I stood still,
And found myself outside the hill,
Left alone against my will,
To go now limping as before,
And never hear of that country more.’”
Fred drew a long breath of relief as he brought his thoughts back from the mountain.
“Well,” he said, “I’m glad I know who they were. I couldn’t bear to think of their being lunatics. And if Gretchen and the two little girls had been as happy as all the rest, I should have thought—”
“What would you have thought?”
Fred hesitated an instant.
“That I was getting a little glimpse into heaven. But then, it couldn’t be that, you know.”