Through the growing dimness of my eyes I saw him in fancy after he was gone. In his eager movement he resembled the figures on Greek reliefs of youths speeding for a prize, and always after in my thought I likened him to those immortal runners and winners of the race.
CHAPTER XXXIX
“All that was death
Grows life, grows love,
Grows love!”
Janet and I came in the next evening out of the warm twilight, and found baby Jean waiting for us with her father and mother in the library.
Janet had spoken again of the Lad’s love for her. We had been walking in the deep green shadows of the trees in the park.
“I cannot understand it,” she said, with a little gasp that was half a sob. “The very air seems warm with the breath of the people who love me. The Lad has made the whole world care. Even the beggars and the children on the street are fond of me.”
We sat in the library for a few minutes, talking of old things and new. As I rose to go, a boy came to the house, bringing a telegram. It said that the Lad had been killed in an accident.
A silence like the hush of eternity fell upon the room. No one dared look at Janet’s face.