,
you know."

"But, that's the same--that is--" She stopped helplessly, bewildered
eyes on David's serene face. Then suddenly a great light came to her
own. "Oh, little boy, I wish I could understand that--just that," she
breathed. "It would make it so much easier--if I could just remember
that they aren't here--that they're WAITING--over there!"

But David apparently did not hear. He had turned and was playing softly
as he walked away. Silently the Lady in Black knelt, listening, looking
after him. When she rose some time later and left the cemetery, the
light on her face was still there, deeper, more glorified.

Toward boys and girls--especially boys--of his own age, David
frequently turned wistful eyes. David wanted a friend, a friend who
would know and understand; a friend who would see things as he saw
them, who would understand what he was saying when he played. It seemed
to David that in some boy of his own age he ought to find such a
friend. He had seen many boys--but he had not yet found the friend.
David had begun to think, indeed, that of all these strange beings in
this new life of his, boys were the strangest.

They stared and nudged each other unpleasantly when they came upon him
playing. They jeered when he tried to tell them what he had been
playing. They had never heard of the great Orchestra of Life, and they
fell into most disconcerting fits of laughter, or else backed away as
if afraid, when he told them that they themselves were instruments in
it, and that if they did not keep themselves in tune, there was sure to
be a discord somewhere.

Then there were their games and frolics. Such as were played with
balls, bats, and bags of beans, David thought he would like very much.
But the boys only scoffed when he asked them to teach him how to play.
They laughed when a dog chased a cat, and they thought it very, very
funny when Tony, the old black man, tripped on the string they drew
across his path. They liked to throw stones and shoot guns, and the
more creeping, crawling, or flying creatures that they could send to
the far country, the happier they were, apparently. Nor did they like
it at all when he asked them if they were sure all these creeping,
crawling, flying creatures wanted to leave this beautiful world and to
be made dead. They sneered and called him a sissy. David did not know
what a sissy was; but from the way they said it, he judged it must be
even worse to be a sissy than to be a thi