He could see the tears upon his mother's cheeks, and he inwardly resolved that her bidding should be done, silently wondering the while what this mysterious source of pain might be.
After a long silence the boy's voice was heard again: "Weren't baby's eyes shut when she died, mother?"
"Yes, darling—yes, they were closed in death," and the unforgetting heart beat fast at the tender memory.
"But they're open now, aren't they, mother?—and wasn't it God that did it?"
"Yes, Harvey, they're open now—God opened them, I'm sure."
"Couldn't He make people see all right before they're dead, mother? Couldn't He do it for you?"
"Yes, child—yes, He could if He wanted to."
"And why wouldn't He want to?" the boy asked wonderingly. "I'm sure He could; and I've been asking Him to do it for us Himself—if we couldn't get the money for the doctor to do it. Wasn't that right, mother?"
The moon, high now, looked down upon the lonely pair; they stood together, they two, beside the unresponsive grave, the elder face bathed in tears, the younger unstained by grief and wistful with the eager trust of childhood. The insignia of poverty was upon them both, and the boy shivered slightly in the chill air; but the great romance and tragedy of life were interwoven there, love and hope and sorrow playing the parts they had so often played before. The woman stooped down amid the glistening grass and took her child into her arms, pressing him close to her troubled bosom, her face against his cheek, while her eyes roved still about his sister's grave.
"We must go on," she murmured presently. "Can you see a light in the church?"