Page:Small Souls (1919).djvu/288

280 “Take Piet with you, then, to help you.”

She nodded her head; and the tears flowed from her eyes, while she drew her book to her, inwardly pleased that he had said so much and said it so kindly. She sighed once more, this time with relief, and read on. But her eyes did not see the words, because she was thinking that to-morrow she would be going with Piet, the butler, in the train—in which she had not been for years and years—to the Hague, to see Henri.

“Go!” the voice had said. “Go!” the voice had commanded.

And she was going. It had come at last, come so near that it would be there to-morrow: not that Henri was coming to her, but that she was going to Henri, to kiss him, to forgive him. . ..

And she read on, did not see the strange words which told what happened to people after death, but wept softly, inaudibly, over her book, wept for still contentment and peace, because he had spoken to her and had said:

“Take Piet with you, then, to help you.”

When it was ten o’clock, he closed his book, stood up. And she would so much have liked to ask him if he too would come with her to-morrow, in the train, to Henri, because it was not so difficult and Piet could take the tickets. But she did not ask him, because she knew that it was even more difficult for him than for her to travel and go by train, that train which he also for years had heard whistling and sometimes rumbling. So she did not ask him,