The door opened very quietly, and in reply to Julian’s incoherent question, the good old servant only shook her head, and turned away to brush off with her apron the tears which she vainly struggled to repress. But the boy burst into the study where he knew that the rest would be, and in another moment his arm was round his mother’s neck, while Cyril and Violet and little Frank drew close and wept silently beside them both. But still Julian knew not or would not know the full truth, and at last he drew up courage to ask the question which had been so long trembling on his lips—
“Is there no hope, mother, no hope?”
“Don’t you know then, my boy? Your father is—”
“Not dead,” said Julian, in a hollow voice. “Oh, mother, mother, mother.”
His head drooped on her shoulder the news fell on him like a horrible blow, and, stunned as he was with weariness and anxiety, all sense and life flowed from him for a time.
The necessity for action and the consolation of others are God’s blessed remedies to lull, during the first intolerable moments, the poignancy of bereavement. Mrs Home had to soothe her children, and to see that they took needful food and rest; and she watched by the bedside of her younger boys till the silken swathe of a soft boyish sleep fell on their eyes, red and swollen with many tears. Then she saw Violet to bed, and at last sat down alone with her eldest son, who by a great prayerful effort aroused himself at last to a sense of his position.
He took her hand in his, and said in a low whisper, “Mother, let me see him?”
“Not now, dearest Julian; wait till to-morrow, for our sakes.”
“What was the cause of death, mother?”
“Disease of the heart;” and once more the widow’s strength seemed likely to give way. But this time it was Julian’s turn to whisper, “God’s will be done.”