oing to school. One day the boy's teacher called at the house and asked
for the father. When they met he said:

"Is your son sick?"

"No; why?"

"He was not at school to-day."

"You don't mean it!"

"Nor yesterday."

"Indeed!"

"Nor the day before."

"Well!"

"And I supposed he was sick."

"No, he's not sick."

"Well, I thought I should tell you."

And the father thanked him, and the teacher left. The father sat thinking
about his son, and those three days. By and by he heard a click at the
gate, and he knew the boy was coming in. So he went to the door to meet
him at once. And the boy knew as he looked up that the father knew about
those three days.

And the father said, "Come into the library, Phil."

And Phil went and the door was shut.

Then the father said very quietly, "Phil, your teacher was here a little
while ago. He tells me you were not at school to-day, nor yesterday, nor
the day before. And we thought you were. You let us think you were. And
you don't know how bad I feel about this. I have always said I could trust
my boy Phil. I always have trusted you. And here you have been a living
lie for three whole days. I can't tell you how bad I feel about it."

Well, it was hard on the boy to be talked to in that gentle way. If his
father had spoken to him roughly, or had taken him out to the wood-shed,
in the rear of the dwelling, it wouldn't have been nearly so hard.

Then the father said, "We'll get down and pray." And the thing was getting
harder for Phil all the time. He didn't want to pray just then. Most
people don't about that time.

And they got down on their knees, side by side. And the father poured out
his heart in prayer. And the boy listened. Somehow he saw himself in the
looking-glass of his knee-joints as he hadn't before. It is queer about
that mirror of the knee-joints, the things you see in it. Most people
don't like to use it much. And they got up from their knees. The father's
eyes were wet. And Phil's eyes were not dry.

Then the father said, "My boy, there's a law of life, that where there is
sin there is suffering. You can't get those two things apart. Wherever
there is suffering there has been sin, somewhere, by somebody. And
wherever there is sin there will be suffering, for some one, somewhere;
and likely most for those closest to you."

"Now," he said, "my boy, you have done wrong. So we'll do this. You go
up-stairs to the attic. I'll make a little bed for you