Rising from his bed, he went out of doors, and looked up into the dark heavens; and high and spectral among the clouded stars he saw the home-coming of the cranes. He sat on the bench beside his door, and watched them sail past in thousands, filling the night with a fleeting clamour and eerie sounds. As he sat he mused on the strange longing which brought these birds over land and sea back home, year by year, with the returning spring, and he marvelled that the souls of men, which are but birds of passage in these earthly fields, should be so slow to feel that longing for their true home-land.
That day when Dorothy came to the hut, he said to her: "It is well to be glad, for, though the air is still keen, the spring is here. I heard the cranes returning in the night."
"And I too heard them; and I heard thee rejoicing, playing on thy harp and singing."
"That could not be, sister," said Waldo, "unless in a dream. No longer can I touch harp-string, as thou knowest."
"In truth I was awake and heard," said Dorothy; "and the song thou wast singing was of birds of passage, and of the longing of exiles to go home, and of the dark wherethrough we must pass, with cries and beating wings, ere we can find our way back to our true home-land.'"
"Nay, it must have been a dream," said Waldo, "for as I sat with my hands hidden in my gown I did but play an imaginary harp, making still music in my heart, and no song came from my lips."
"The more strange that I should hear!" replied Dorothy, smiling as she went her way.
In a little while from this the poor brother felt that the end of his martyrdom drew nigh; and as he lay feeble and faint in the shadow of the hut (for the day was clement), sighing for the hour of his deliverance, Dorothy came from the woods. In her hand she carried a basket, and as she stood over him she said, "See what I have brought for thee."
Lifting his head weakly, and looking through the eyelets of his grey mask, Waldo saw that the basket contained three golden apples and three red roses, though still it was but early days in spring. At sight of them he uttered a cry of gladness (for all it was a cry hollow and hoarse), and strove to rise and throw himself at her feet.
"Nay, brother," she said, "refrain; lie still and breathe the sweetness of the roses and taste of the fruit."