“I’m goin’ now, Hannah, so ye needn’t stay out o’ the kitchen for me,” and he climbed slowly up the stairs which led to his room.

As the rosy day dawned in the east, Draxy’s infant son drew his first mortal breath.  His first quivering cry, faint almost as a whisper, yet sharp and piteous, reached old Ike’s ears instantly.  He fell on his knees and remained some minutes motionless, then he rose and went slowly down-stairs.  Hannah met him at the door, her dark face flushed with emotion which she vainly tried to conceal by sharp words.

“Hope ye’ve rested well, Mr. Sanborn.  Another time, mebbe ye’ll have more sense.  As fine a boy’s ye ever see, and Mis’ Kinney she’s a smilin’ into its face, as nobody’s never seen her smile yet, I tell you.”

Ike was gone,—­out into the fields, over fences, over brooks, into woods, trampling down dewy ferns, glistening mosses, scarlet cornels, thickets of goldenrod and asters,—­he knew not where, muttering to himself all the while, and tossing his arms into the air.  At last he returned to the house saying to himself, “P’raps th’ Elder ’ll like to have me go down into the village an’ let folks know.”

Elder Kinney was standing bareheaded on the door-steps.  His face looked like the face of a man who had come off a battle-field where victory had been almost as terrible as defeat.  As soon as he saw old Ike running across the field towards him, he divined all.

“Loving old heart!” he thought, “Draxy was right,” and he held out both his hands to the old man as he had never done before, and spoke a few affectionate words, which made tears run down the wrinkled cheeks.  Then he sent him on the errand he knew he craved.

“You’d better give the news first to Eben Hill, Ike,” he called after him.  “It’ll be of more use to him than to anybody in the parish.”

It was just two years from Draxy’s wedding day, when she stood again in the aisle of the little village church, dressed in pure white, with the southern sunlight resting on her beautiful hair.  Her husband stood by her side, holding their infant son in his arms.  The child had clear, calm blue eyes like Draxy’s, and an expression of serenity and radiant joy on his tiny face, which made the people wonder.

“Reuben Miller Kinney” was his name; and though the parish had hoped that the child would be named for his father, when they looked at Reuben Miller’s sweet, patient, noble face, and saw its intense happiness as the words were spoken, they felt that it was better so.

Again swift months rolled on, and peace and joy brooded over the parsonage.  Draxy’s life with her child was something too beautiful to be told in words; her wifehood was lovely, was intense; but her motherhood was greater.  Day and night her love for her boy protected and guided him, like pillar of cloud, like pillar of fire.  She knew no weariness, no feebleness; she grew constantly stronger and more beautiful, and