Leaning back in infinite weariness, he gazed into the fire, silently. In the dusky room the fire glow was rosy warm about them, as they sat in twin chairs before the hearth. Silently the old footman had entered, and across the room had lighted and turned low a green-shaded lamp. Lucy sat motionless. A coal slipped down, with a whisper, glowed, and dimmed to ashes.
“What have you desired, Henry?”
The Bishop turned, “You have had all my dreams,” he answered, “so you know.” A strange mysticism showed upon his face, “I have desired to-day, to give all that I had to the poor, and to the rich, to the rich! And I could not!” At her look of puzzled curiosity, he explained quickly, with a passing smile, “But that is a Christmas secret, between Dr. Newbold and me. And besides, it is all over, now,—that little Christmas dream.” Again a long gaze into the fire where one can watch one’s wishes glowing, dying. “And I have desired most of all, to leave my work to someone who would understand and carry it on!”
“Who could understand, Henry,” she whispered, “your work?”
He turned his head toward her, quick and sunny. “You alone, perhaps, and therefore you will help him to understand.”
“How?”
“By giving him courage, as you have given it to me.”
“I never gave you courage.”
“Yes! And so, let me believe, you will give it to him!”
“Courage for what? Be explicit, dreamer!”