The Judge smiled. She was not a selfish child.
“I could spare one for the dear bird with the overcoat on and its collar turned up,” she said, sweetly.
The Judge looked puzzled.
“S-s-she means Sukey,” explained Titus.
“Thank you, little girl; pigeons do not eat candy.”
“Then I think you had better take one,” she said, shyly, coming toward him with the box outstretched in her hand.
O, sweet little childish face and childish grace!—and the judge’s eyes grew moist. Once years and years ago God had given him two little daughters—two dream children, it seemed to him now, so many were the years that had passed since he laid the little childish forms away in a country churchyard. O, children, so long lamented, yet now almost forgotten.
“Little girl,” he said, gently, “I once had two small daughters not as old as you.”
Bethany looked over her shoulder, as if he were speaking of some one present.
“What do they look like?” she asked, wistfully. “Are their faces white like mine, and have they thin brown curls?”