The boy seemed in his usual health, and was sleeping peacefully—dreaming pleasantly, for the ghost of a smile glinted about his just parted lips. Then upon the father—who was not, with all his hardness, devoid of imagination—came the wonder of watching a dreamer. What might be going on within that brain? Splendid visions might be gliding through the soul of the sleeper—his child, born of his body and his soul—and not one of them was open to him!

But how much nearer to him in reality was the child when awake and about the house? Even then, how much did he know of the thoughts, the loves, the imaginations, the desires, the aspirations that moved in the heart and the brain of the child? The boy was sickly—he might be taken from him before he had made any true acquaintance with him! He was just the sort of child to die young! Certainly he might see him in the other world, but the boy would have so few memories of him, so few associations with him, that it would be hard to tie the new to the old!

He turned away and went back to his room. There, with a sense of loneliness deeper than he had ever felt before, he went down on his knees to beg the company of God whose existence he had so often defended as if it were in danger from his creatures, but whom he had so little regarded as actually existent that he had not yet sought refuge with him. All the house was asleep—the major had long ended his prayers and was slumbering by the fire—when Raymount knelt before the living source of his life, and rose from his knees a humbler man.

41. A Sad Beginning

—Forty-One —

A Sad Beginning

Toward morning Gerald Raymount went to bed and slept late. Alas, when he woke the old feeling had returned! How could he forgive the son that had so disgraced him!

Instead of going once again to the living strength, he began to try to persuade himself on philosophical grounds that the best thing would be to forgive his son, that it was the part of the wise man to abstain from harshness. But he had little success with himself. Anger and pride were too much for him. His breakfast was taken to him in the study, and there Hester found him an hour later, his food still untouched. He submitted to her embrace, but scarcely spoke and asked nothing about Corney. Hester felt sadly chilled and hopeless.