“But at my back I always hear
Time’s winged chariot hurrying near. …”
Ah, what a second-rater he was! How he always thought of everything in terms of what somebody else had said! In earlier days when he was a boy and still thought he might perhaps amount to something this had been an affliction to him, a secret shame. But now he did not grieve over it. Since he had died and come back to this other life, he took everything and himself, too, more simply, with little concern for the presentability of the role he was to play. If, honestly, that was the sort of nature he had, why rebel against it? The only people who got anywhere by rebelling were rebels to begin with. And he was not. Why wasn’t it enough, anyhow, to love the beauties other men had created?
He heard Stephen come back into the kitchen. He had been gone quite a while after that toy.
“Father,” said Stephen softly, behind him.
Lester started at the color of the little voice. There was something queer about it.
Cautiously, with his ever-present dread of intruding, he glanced at Stephen not curiously, but with a casual air.
The little boy came up to his chair and stood there, looking up at him with a strange expression of shining-quiet in his eyes. He had evidently been crying hard, for his cheeks were covered with the smeary marks of black where he had wiped off the tears with his dirty hands. But what on earth could he have been crying about? There had not been a sound.
And he did not look like a child who has been crying. He looked … he was smiling now … he looked like a little golden seraph hovering around the golden gates.
“Father,” said Stephen in a small, clear voice. He hesitated, evidently trying to think of something to say, his shining eyes fixed on his father’s. Finally he brought out, “Wouldn’t you like me to bring you a drink of water?” His smile, as he said this, was dazzling, his voice sweet, sweet with loving-kindness.
“Why, yes, Stevie,” said his father over a lump in his throat, “I do believe I am thirsty without realizing it.”
Stephen pushed a chair before him to the sink, climbed up on it, took down the dipper and held it under the faucet. The bright water gushed out, spattering over him, over the floor. He caught half the dipper full, turned off the faucet, and carried the dipper awkwardly back to his father, who took a long drink appreciatively.
“Thank you, old man,” he said as he handed it back.
Stephen set it back on the table and returned to hover near his father, smiling up at him speechlessly.
Lester felt the room filled with the flutter of airy, unseen wings and ached with his helpless wonder at them. What could have happened? What could have happened? He held his breath for fear of saying the wrong thing in his clumsy ignorance. All he dared do was to smile silently back at Stephen.
“Father,” said Stephen again, although he evidently had nothing to add to the word, “Father. …” He could think of nothing else to say to express the mysteriously born fullness of his heart.
“Yes, Stevie,” said his father, his own heart very full.
“Father … would it hurt your sick legs very much if I sat in your lap for a while?”
Lester reached out hungrily and pulled the child up into his arms. “There’s just one good thing that can be said about my sick legs, Stephen,” he said, trying to be whimsical, “they positively cannot be hurt any more.”
Stephen laughed a little, nestled, turned himself, and then with a long sigh as though he were very, very tired, with a sudden relaxation of all his warm little body, was asleep, his round dark head falling back limply on his father’s shoulder.
Lester was almost frightened. Had the child fainted? Was he sick? But the expression on Stephen’s face was of complete calm. It looked like a smooth, closed bud, secret and serene, close-wrapped, all the personality at rest, nothing left but the tender mask of flesh.
Lester stirred involuntarily a hair’s breadth. Stephen felt the movement and his eyes flew open wide for an instant. At first they were shallow and meaningless in a mere physical opening. Then, before sleep took him wholly, he recognized his father, and all that made the little boy Stephen shone out of his eyes like a candle leaping up brightly before it goes out. That look was for Lester. Without stirring, in the exquisite smile of his eyes, his lips, all his transfigured little face, Stephen gave himself lovingly to his father.
Long after the burning little spirit had gone elsewhere, leaving the inert, deep-breathing, warm, small body on the paralyzed knees, his father sat there, his lips quivering.
Presently he said to himself, “And I am the man who, three months ago, was so eager to get out of life.”
Part IV
XVIII
When Evangeline read the little note asking her to step into Mr. Willing’s office, she thought of course the new things from Hasenheimer’s had come, and that Mr. Willing would ask her if she could come back that evening to help unpack and place them. But it was Mrs. Willing’s voice which called “Come in!” to her knock, and the moment she opened the door she knew by the expression on Mr. Willing’s face that something important was on the way.
Mr. Willing waited till she and his wife had gone through the necessary greetings and then brought it out flatly, “Mrs. Knapp, Miss Flynn has just told us that, because of certain changes in her family affairs, she will be leaving us next month.”
He went on talking after this, but Evangeline did not need to hear him. She knew everything that he would say
