"And in this battle will there still be room and time for a small, peaceful home? And for a little, tender child?"
"Why not, Elsje? There too are peaceful dwellings and many tender little children also are born there. The fighting does not go on constantly."
"I shall see that I am ready," said Elsje. And she was, in good time.
XXVII
We stood upon the deck of the great trans-Atlantic steamer and our color-thirsty eyes drank in the rich scene of the cliffs and hills of Ireland, rising above a calm sea under a sky heavy with rain. Dark grayish-purple, light gray and white rain clouds to one side, above us a clear limpid blue, a short fragment of a rainbow rising out of the light emerald-green sea, and stretching straight across the faded brown and dull green land with the little white houses, on to the blackish-gray cloud which flowed out into mist and against which the bright colors shone dazzlingly. Thousands of white gulls round about the ship, like a whirling, living snow flurry, glittering in the bright sunlight and contrasting sharply with the dark background of clouds - screaming and screeching wildly and ceaselessly.
"The sign of the covenant," said I, pointing to the rainbow.
"Do you really believe, Vico, that God gives such signs to men?"
"What do you mean by 'God,' Elsje?"
Elsje looked at me with pensive wonder.
"Do you then only believe in Christ and not in God?"