"If I bid thee go," she murmured, "thee would not disobey me now I'm dyin'?"
"Don't send me," he cried; "don't bid me go!"
"Nay," she said tenderly, "I'm bound to bid thee, and thee art bound to go. It 'ud be no comfort to see thee nigh me, if I couldn't die happy for thinkin' o' the little lad in the pit. And it's partly because thee hasn't forgiven Nutkin. And if we forgive not men their sins, neither will our Heavenly Father forgive ours. That's what the blessed Lord says. And oh, if thee forgives him, the Lord will forgive thee. Go, Ishmael; I shall see thee again—not here, maybe—but in some better place."
"I'll go," he said, looking into her face very sorrowfully; "but, oh, if I never see thee again in this world, it 'll seem hard to wait till we get to heaven."
Still Elsie's impatient and entreating voice reached their ears, urging him to make haste, and his mother's sunken eyes were fastened upon him with a look in them as if she was beseeching him to go. It might be the last time he would ever see her face. With a deep and heavy sigh, Ishmael stooped to kiss her, and, as if afraid to trust himself to linger another moment, he sprang down the ladder, and, pushing on through bramble and brushwood, quickly reached the entrance of the cave.
It was no longer dark and solitary. Many of the villagers were there, and the glimmer of several lanterns produced a lurid and fitful light. Nutkin knelt at the far end of the cave before the low and narrow inlet, through which, when there was a moment's silence, he fancied he could hear in the black darkness the voice of his child crying.
"The men will be here with pickaxes soon, Nutkin," said the squire, who stood beside him, "and we'll get the little fellow out in a very short time, my man."
"I'm more afeard of the picks bringing the old roof in than aught else, sir," answered Nutkin, in a voice of despair; "there's been a deal o' heavy rain o' late, and there's been two or three hollows given in above ground; and if the roof gave way betwixt us and the little lad he'd die o' fright before we could dig him out. If the hole was but big enough for a man to creep through! But nobody could creep through a hole no bigger than a rabbit-bury; only a teeny creature like little Willie."
A profound silence followed Nutkin's speech, for no man or woman there could risk the life of any of their boys by sending them into the workings of the old quarry. And amid the silence there was heard plainly enough a low stifled voice speaking.
"I can crawl through," it said; "I know every step o' the old pit."