I think so, too,
Colorado," he said. "I think so, too! That was like my boy Rento, but
not like Franci. Franci dies every time he see a snake, and come to life
only to find out if somebody else is killed. See, my son, how beautiful
the moon on the water! Let us look for a few moments, to take the beauty
into us, and then I must send my little friend to his bed, that nothing
harmful comes to him."
So they sat hand in hand for awhile, gazing their fill, saying nothing;
there was the same look in the two faces, so widely different. The
little boy, with his clear brow, his blue eyes limpid as a mountain
pool, shining with the heavens reflected in them; the dark Spaniard (if
he were a Spaniard!) with lines of sadness, shadows of thought and of
bitter experience, making his bronze face still darker; what was there
alike in these two, who had come together from the ends of the earth?
The thought was one, in both hearts, and the look of it shone in the
eyes of both as they sat in the moonlight white and clear. What was the
thought? Look into the face of your child as it kneels to pray at close
of day! Look into the face of any good and true man when he is lifted
above the things of to-day, and sees the beauty and the mystery, and
hears the eternal voices sounding!
"'Morning, evening, noon and night,
Praise God!' sang Theocrite."
CHAPTER VIII.
IN THE NIGHT.
The evening had been peaceful, all beauty and silence; but not so the
night for the boy John. Something was the matter; he could not sleep.
The bunk in the little cabin was comfortable enough for anyone, but to
him it was a couch for an emperor. He speculated on the probability of
George the Third's having had anything like so luxurious a bed, and
rejected the thought as absurd. There were no lumps in the mattress,
neither any holes through which sharp fingers of straw came out and
scratched him. The red curtains at the sides could be drawn at will,
and, drawing them, he found himself in a little world of his own, warm
and still and red. The shells were outside in the other world; he could
look out at any moment and see them, and touch them, take them up; his
friend had said so. Now, however, it seemed best just to be alive, and
to stay still and wonder what would become of him. He heard the Skipper
come down and go to bed, and soon the sound of deep, regular breathing
told that he slept, the man of wonder; but John could not sleep. And now
other thoug
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