Some one touched her on the shoulder, and she looked round; and behind her was a great company of the dear children from the better country, whom the Father had sent, and not her,—­lest he should grieve for those he had left behind,—­to come for the child and show him the way.  She paused for a moment, scarcely willing to give him up; but then her companion touched her and pointed to the other side.  Ah, that was different!  The mother lay by the side of the bed, her face turned only to the little white body which her child had dropped from him as he came out of his sickness,—­her eyes wild with misery, without tears; her feverish mouth open, but no cry in it.  The sword of the angel had gone through and through her.  She did not even writhe upon it, but lay motionless, cut down, dumb with anguish.  The father had turned round again and leaned his head upon the wall.  All was over,—­all over!  The love and the hope of a dozen lovely years, the little sweet companion, the daily joy, the future trust—­all—­over—­as if a child had never been born.  Then there rose in the stillness a great and exceeding bitter cry, ‘God!’ that was all, pealing up to heaven, to the Father, whom they could not see in their anguish, accusing Him, reproaching Him who had done it.  Was He their enemy that He had done it?  No man was ever so wicked, ever so cruel but he would have spared them their boy,—­taken everything and spared them their boy; but God, God!  The little Pilgrim stood by and wept.  She could do nothing but weep, weep, her heart aching with the pity and the anguish.  How were they to be told that it was not God, but the Father; that God was only His common name, His name in law, and that He was the Father.  This was all she could think of; she had not a word to say.  And the boy had shaken his little bright soul out of the sickness and the weakness with such a look of delight!  He knew in a moment!  But they—­oh, when, when would they know?

Presently she sat outside in the soft breathing airs and little morning breezes, and dried her aching eyes.  And the Sage who was her companion soothed her with kind words.  ’I said you would feel the thorns as you passed,’ he said.  ‘We cannot be free of them, we who are of mankind.’

‘But oh,’ she cried amid her tears, ’why,—­why?  The air of the earth is in my eyes, I cannot see.  Oh, what pain it is, what misery!  Was it because they loved him too much, and that he drew their hearts away?’

The Sage only shook his head at her, smiling.  ‘Can one love too much?’ he said.

’O brother, it is very hard to live and to see another—­I am confused in my mind,’ said the little Pilgrim, putting her hand to her eyes.  ’The tears of those that weep have got into my soul.  To live and see another die,—­that was what I was saying; but the child lives like you and me.  Tell me, for I am confused in my mind.’

‘Listen!’ said the Sage; and when she listened she heard the sound of the children going back with a great murmur and ringing of pleasant voices like silver bells in the air, and among them the voice of the child asking a thousand questions, calling them by their names.  The two pilgrims listened and laughed to each other for love at the sound of the children.  ‘Is it for the little brother that you are troubled?’ the Sage said in her ear.