She looked at me with those deep, intense eyes. A new light seemed to come into them; it overspread her face, and lit up her thin, wan features with a strange glow.
'It must be so,' she said, 'else why were you led here? God must have sent you to me for that!'
'No doubt he did, madam. Let it comfort you to think so.'
'It does, oh! it does. And, O my Father!' and she looked up to Him as she spoke: 'I thank thee! Thy poor, sinful, dying child thanks thee; and, oh! bless him, forever bless him, for it!'
I turned away to hide the emotion I could not repress. A moment after, not seeing the little boy, I asked:
'Where is your son?'
'Here, sir.' And turning down the bed-clothing, she showed him sleeping quietly by her side, all unconscious of the misery and the sin around him, and of the mighty crisis through which his young life was passing.
Saying I would return on the following day, I shortly afterward bade her 'good-night,' and left the house.
CHAPTER III.
It was noon on the following day when I again visited the house in Anthony street. As I opened the door of the sick woman's room, I was startled by her altered appearance. Her eye had a strange, wild light, and her face already wore the pallid hue of death. She was bolstered up in bed, and the little boy was standing by her side, weeping, his arms about her neck. I took her hand in mine, and in a voice which plainly spoke my fears, said: