Page:Hegan Rice--Mrs Wiggs of the cabbage patch.djvu/42

  yer pa an' me 'ud take you out at the harvestin' time, an' you 'ud play on the hay-stacks. I kin remember jes' how you looked, Jim—a fat little boy, with red cheeks a-laughin' all the time."

Mrs. Wiggs could tell no more, for the old memories were too much for her. Jim scarcely knew when she stopped; his eyes were half closed, and a sweet drowsiness was upon him.

"It's nice an' warm in the sunshine," he murmured; "the meaders an' trees—laughin' all the time! Birds singin', singin', singin'."

Then Jim began to sing too, softly and monotonously, and the sorrow that had not come with years left his tired face, and he fearlessly drifted away into the Shadowy Valley where his lost childhood lay.