"Here are the pennies for my berries, Uncle Benny," she said quietly. "I've taken just a quart."
"Yes, yes; all right, Vesty. I'm—ahem!—engaged, Vesty. Such a bew-tiful——"
Vesty held her hands on his head. "Uncle Benny" (she would never, even to please him, call him Dr. Spearmint), "you must not think of that. She did not mean that. Besides, you have promised to be always a friend to me, don't you remember?—and to lead the children home from school. You know your mother expects"—they glanced up together at the picture—"that you will do what Jesus told you about doing—that about leading the little children home from school. What if one of them should get lost, or hurt? O Uncle Benny!"
"Oh, my!" he gasped. "I didn't think, Vesty," tears streaming down his pale but now placid and restored face.
Vesty smiled, standing there. A light crossed her face; she began to sing:
"The road is winding, the road is dark,
Sail away to Galilee!"
******
Her voice seemed to me, in that dim hour, to take up Uncle Benny and bear him away, with his great hurt, to the breast of his mother, in heaven, to be healed.
He joined her in the chorus, and then they sang together, she modulating sweetly her full, rich tones to his. Her voice made heavenly rapture of Uncle Benny's song:
'There 's a tree I see in Paradise—
Sail away to Galilee.
It 's the beautiful, waiting Tree of Life—
Sail away to Galilee,
Sail away to Galilee,
Put on your long white robe of peace,
And sail away to Galilee."