A SUNLIT CONVALESCENCE
One afternoon, towards two o'clock, my father took his hat, and said to me, in rather a mysterious tone:
"I must go out on an errand. I'll be back in a moment."
Half an hour later I became aware of shuffling going on outside my door. Somebody knocked.
"Come in!"
A little boy, dressed in black, appeared on the threshold. My heart gave a bound. That prominent forehead, where fair curls rolled, that straight, brilliant gaze. Victor! Victor, at five years old. Victor as he had been when my eyes had opened on him as a little child.
It was his son—little Robert.
Behind him was my sister-in-law. She came straight up to my bed, and bent down, raising her long widow's veil. We kissed each other, and I demanded my little niece Brigitte, who was shy and was burying her face in her mother's skirts.
The conversation immediately started off, quite naturally and delightfully, free of its whilom reserve. We ingenuously confessed that we had learnt to know each other, and how we had felt the mutual affection grow, in the course of these terrible months.