At last it came.
“Yes,” Rodney said. “I will look into it thoroughly. It must be a big thing to do what it did last night. And to you—though that’s another story. It hit me when you would not marry me, stuck to the Church, though you didn’t seem to care much about her. I know a chap who is a Dominican in Chicago; he and I were confirmed together. I’ll hunt him up. It’s a promise.”
“Then God bless you, Rodney, and I’ll pray for you hard. It’s good-bye, now, isn’t it? I heard the Angelus from our church faintly ever so long ago,” said Cis, rising.
Rodney pulled out his watch.
“I’ll say it was long ago!” he cried. “I’ll have to eat on the train. But it won’t take me long to connect with my bag at the hotel. Everything else is done. Cis, good-bye. Oh, Cis, good-bye! Not for always? Let me come again!”
“Better not, Rodney. I’m not going to stay here, though; not long. I think this time it is for always, yet we may meet again; there should be many days before we are old. Truly God bless you, Rodney,” said Cis, holding out her hand.
Their hands met over the sleeping baby; he seemed like a figure of their complete separation, filling the place of the child who would never be.
“Kiss me, Holly,” Rodney whispered.
“Our hands hold all that we give,” Cicely answered, and once more he bowed to her will.
“I shall remember you looking like a madonna. Good-bye, good-bye, ah, Cis, good-bye!” Rodney lifted to his cheek the hand he held, then laid it upon the child’s breast, beside its mate.