"That is up to John," responded James.
"And father?" asked the mother.
"Whatever John says about it," replied the father.
"Now, everything is up to you, sister," said John. "Are you going?"
"Why, of course, brother," she answered. "When?"
"Tomorrow," replied John.
So it was settled. That night, as John lay down to sleep in his old bed, so pure and white, in a little room up stairs, he heard again, above the screeching insects, the booming frogs, the wailing owls, that old sweet song that carried him into the slumberous land of nowhere—"Good bye! Good bye!"—as on so many nights before.
In the night, when the house was still, a gray-haired man, in night clothes and carrying a lighted lamp, softly stole into John's room. John lay with his face upturned, his eyes closed, and his lips parted in a sleeping smile. The father stood over him a moment, bent down and touched his lips to his son's brow. "He is a good boy yet," he said to himself, and softly stole away.
Anne was singing, as she went about her work, when John awoke in the morning; and life was astir on every hand. The pigs were squealing in their sty; the calves were bawling in their pens; ducks were squawking in their pond; chickens were cackling in the barn yard, and the sun was shining everywhere. John dressed himself and descended the narrow stairway, with tousled head and open shirt front. The mother was milking the cows, James was in the field, and the father was in the barn. Anne was preparing breakfast.
"Now, I may see you in the sunlight, sister," said John, as he sauntered into the old-fashioned kitchen, and stood before her, with folded arms, and half yawning yet from sleep, as she was spreading the cloth upon the table. "I didn't know I had such a dear little sister," he said, as he put his arm about her and kissed her on the lips.