g held them back; but inward
gradually until the line, no longer straight, was half a circle,
crescent shaped. Louder came that harrowing medley of sounds, its
component parts voicing the uttermost depths of the soul of each
separate individual man and woman there--some moaned in terror; some
prayed, mumbling, still upon their knees; some laughed hoarsely,
wildly, their senses for the moment gone; and some were dumb; and some
shrieked their prayers in frenzy. Louder it grew--the end had come--that
deformed thing stood erect, a perfect man--he turned his face toward
them--he stretched out his arms--and they answered him with their wails,
their sobs, their moans, their cries--they answered him in their terror,
in their shaken senses, clutching at each other again--answered him from
their knees, their voices hoarse--answered him with trembling lips and
tongues that would not move.

And then suddenly, as though riven where they stood and kneeled and
crouched, all movement ceased--and every heart stood still as ringing
clear above all else, shocking all else to stunned, petrified silence,
there came a cry--a cry in a young voice. It rang again and again,
trembling with glad, new life, vibrant, a cry that seemed to thrill with
chords of happiness and ecstasy immeasurable. Again it came, again,
exultant, pulsing with a mighty joy--young Holmes had _flung his crutch
from him_, and, with outstretched arms, was running toward the Patriarch
across the lawn.

For an instant more that stunned, awed silence held. All eyes were
riveted and fixed upon the scene--none looked at Madison--if any had
they would have seen that his face had gone an ivory white.

--XI--

THE AFTERMATH

"I am cured, Robert! Robert! Robert! See, I too am cured! Oh, Robert,
what wondrous joy!"--Mrs. Thornton had left her wheel-chair and was
standing beside her husband, standing alone, unaided for the first time
in many months.

"Naida!"--it was a hoarse cry from Thornton. Then his hand passed
heavily across his face as though to force his brain to coherent action,
to lift the spell of what seemed a wild phantasm in all around him.
"Naida!"--he sought now to control his voice--"Naida, get back into your
chair again."

She laughed--a little hysterically--but in the laugh too was the uplift
of a soul enraptured.

"But I am cured, Robert. See, dear, can't you understand?" She shook his
arm. "See--I am cured. I can walk just as I could before I was