hting over the dead hen; from the
bathroom came the sound of a sputtering gush from the hot-water faucet;
then splashes and whining protests, and maternal adjurations: "You got
to look decent! I _will_ wash behind your ears. You're the worst boy on
the street!"

"Eleanor tried to save him," he thought; "she came here, and begged for
him!"

Above the bathroom noises came Lily's voice, sharp with efficiency, but
shaking with pity and a quick-hearted purpose of helping: "Say, Mr.
Curtis! Could she eat some fresh doughnuts? (Jacky, if you don't stand
still I'll give you a regular spanking! I _didn't_ put soap in your
eyes!) If she can, I'll fry some for her to-morrow."

Maurice, tramping back and forth, made no answer; he was saying to
himself, "If she'll just live, I will make her happy! Oh, she _must_
live!" It was then that, suddenly, agonizingly, in the midst of
splashings, and Jacky's whines, and Lily's anxiety about soap and
doughnuts, Maurice Curtis prayed ...

He did not know it was prayer; it was just a cry: "Do something--oh,
_do_ something! _Do you hear me?_ She tried so hard to save Jacky. Make
her get well!" So it was that, in his selfless cry for happiness for
Eleanor, Maurice found all those differing realizations--Joy, and Law,
and Life, and Love--and lo! they were one--a personality! God. In his
frantic words he established a relationship with _Him_--not It, any
longer! "Please, please make her get well," he begged, humbly.

At that moment, at the door of the dining room, appeared an immaculate
Jacky in his new suit, his face shining with bliss and soap. He came and
stood beside Maurice, waiting his monarch's orders, and listening,
without comprehension, to the conversation:

"Nothing will be said to him that will ... give anything away. She just
wants to see him. His presence in the room--"

Jacky gave a little leap. "Did you say _presents_!"

"--his merely being there will please her. She loves him, Lily. You see,
she's always wanted children, and--we've never had any."

Jacky's mother said, in a muffled voice, "My land!" Then she caught
Jacky in her arms and kissed him all over his face.

"Aw, stop," said Jacky, greatly embarrassed; to have Mr. Curtis see him
being kissed, "like a kid!" was a cruel mortification. "Aw, let up,"
said Jacky.

When he and Mr. Curtis started in to town his eyes seemed to grow bluer,
and his face more beaming, and his voice, asking endless questions, more
joyous