"I don't know,"--said Fleda, still looking at the stars,--"I suppose--I was thinking--"
"What?" said Mr. Carleton, inexpressibly curious to get at the workings of the child's mind, which was not easy, for Fleda was never very forward to talk of herself;--"what were you thinking? I want to know how you could get such a thing into your head."
"It wasn't very strange," said Fleda. "The stars made me think of heaven, and grandpa's being there, and then I thought how he was ready to go there and that made him ready to die--"
"I wouldn't think of such things, Elfie," said Mr. Carleton after a few minutes.
"Why not, sir?" said Fleda quickly.
"I don't think they are good for you."
"But Mr. Carleton," said Fleda gently,--"if I don't think about it, how shall I ever be ready to die?"
"It is not fit for you," said he, evading the question,--"it is not necessary now,--there's time enough. You are a little body and should have none but gay thoughts."
"But Mr. Carleton," said Fleda with timid earnestness,--"don't you think one could have gay thoughts better if one knew one was ready to die?"
"What makes a person ready to die, Elfie?" said her friend, disliking to ask the question, but yet more unable to answer hers, and curious to hear what she would say.