Oh, the memory of that long, beautiful afternoon among the pines, with the sun sifting down through the leaves and the taller trees waving way up almost touching the sky it seemed, and the drone of bees somewhere, the distant whetting of a scythe—how it all came back as she thought it over!
And then the book was finished and they sat back, sorry it was done, dreamy with the loveliness of the story in which they had been absorbed.
“That’s a cracker-jack tale,” declared the boy. “Gee, I’d like to have that dog. My dog died,” he ended sadly. “Got run over by a truck.”
They talked a little about the dog and the boy got out a dirty little snap shot of himself with the dog in his arms when it was only a little puppy, and the little girl smiled and said it was a darling.
Then somehow Aunt Mary led them around to talk of other things, of how still it was in the woods, and how beautiful, and how God must love it there. The boy’s face grew sober and wistful and wonder came in his eyes with a kind of softness. Aunt Mary got out her little Testament and read the story of the healing of the man who was born blind, in the ninth chapter of John. How they thrilled to the story all the way through, as the different actors came and went, the blind man himself, his wondering neighbors, the scornful Jews, the cowardly parents, Jesus, who came to find him after they had all left him, even down to the words that Jesus spoke to the fault-finding Jews: “If ye were blind, ye should have no sin: but now ye say, We see; therefore your sin remaineth.” How strange that those words should sound even after these years, with the murmuring of the pines among the words, and the holy stillness afterward, while the shadows grew long and violet within the sanctuary of trees where they sat, and dusk was all about them. The boy’s lashes drooped thoughtfully and his whole face took on a far-away look. Then Aunt Mary’s voice came again softly praying: “Dear Jesus, we know You are here today just as then. Help us for Christ’s sake to have our eyes open to sin, so that we shall always know when we are not pleasing Thee. Amen.”
They had gone out together silently through the quiet aisles with only the tall singing of the pines and the distant melody of thrushes in their evening song above them. The boy had gathered up the basket and his fishing rod, and helped them over the fence with a kind of reverence upon him.
They had walked down the road to the village with that beautiful intimacy still upon them, like friends who had seen a vision together and would never forget. All the way to their door the boy had gone, saying very little, but with an uplifted look upon his face. Aunt Mary had asked him to come and see them sometime, and he had suddenly grown shy and silent, dropped his eyes and set his young shoulders as if he had come to a hard spot. “Well, g’bye!” he said gruffly, and turning, darted out the gate and down the street, flashing them a wonderful smile as he went. He had become suddenly all boy again.
He had come again several times with gifts—a splendid plant of squawberry vine with bright red berries hanging to it, a great sheaf of crimson leaves and sumac berries, a handkerchief full of ripe chestnuts.
When winter came again they sometimes found their paths shovelled around the house very early in the morning and caught a glimpse of a red sweater and gray cap going down the street as they arose.
There had been several times at school when Joyce felt his protection against the larger boys who snowballed most unmercifully.