“He is having his adventures. He will be a great man. He will have the world at his finger-tips, when he is as old as we are—and then his real work will begin. For when we know enough of the world, we turn to God.”
The note of the preacher in this did not embarrass Bellair, as it would have done before the Jade’s sinking.
“He will be a great power,” Fleury went on, for the heart of the mother. “These things which for him pass unconsciously, will form him nevertheless. They will do their work within; and when he is grown he will know what to do and say.”
“How do you know?” the mother asked.
“Chiefly because I believe in you,” he answered.
“I want him to live,” she said.
“We want that, too,” said Fleury.
Bellair felt himself nodding in the dark.
“If he is to be a great man, he will have to live through his first—at least, through this adventure.”
The meaning came very pure to Bellair. It had to do with crackers and water for the nourishment of the child. So strong and sure was her own fortitude that she did not need to say she was thinking only of food and drink for him. It meant to Bellair, “If I cannot nurse him, he will die.”