“That’s true; it may be the secret of the sympathy between them. For a long time I thought they would never get together, but it’s been coming, and now—and to-day—— This has been such a wonderful day, in spite of the sadness of it! You were at morning service?”
“Yes, Mrs. Burns.”
“None of us will ever forget it.”
“No.”
The big car had them up in the hills in short order. As they came over the last steep rise Red whistled sharply with surprise.
“My faith!” he ejaculated. “Where do they all come from, in this God-forsaken region!”
“God hasn’t forsaken it. That’s a man-made phrase. But they can’t all come from this locality. I should say not—and they haven’t.... Why, there are my boys—any number of them. Well!”
Black leaped out of the car, which had been instantly surrounded. Here they certainly were, ranks upon ranks of boys and young men, not only from his church but from the town outside. Everyone of them wore a tiny American flag on his coat-lapel.
“You see,” explained young Perkins, lively usher at the Stone Church, “we didn’t see how we could spare you to come off up here this last day unless we came along. Please excuse us for butting in, but we couldn’t stand it any other way.”
“We mean it as a sort of guard of honour,” declared a tall boy, just out of short trousers, and extraordinarily disputatious for his age, with whom Black had held many a warm argument in past days. “Besides, we——”