The captain raised his head and looked at him. "Perhaps she was happy in her new life; perhaps----"
The man broke in upon the words fiercely. "She died in shame and want and misery. The man had tired of his plaything; in his cold and brutal letter he told me that they had not agreed, and that he had deemed it wiser to part from her. He begged of me to believe"--the scorn in the old man's voice as he flung out his arm passionately was terrible--"that he would have married her had it been possible; he was sorry for her death."
He had drawn his arm, in an uncouth fashion, across his eyes, and his voice shook as he finished. Presently he let his arm fall to his side and looked about him in that curious, helpless way, with something of a smile upon his face.
"And so you see," he went on, in a gentler tone, "I live on here from day to day, and dream my dreams; and am happy to forget sometimes which is truth and which is dream. And then quite suddenly one day, while I sat at my work here, I lifted up my eyes and saw--O God, my heart leaps now when I think of it!--saw _her_, as I thought, come back to me, a baby again, standing in the doorway smiling. That was the best dream of all; that is the best dream still." He raised his eyes, laughed aloud, and clasped his hands.
"Does she come here often?" asked the captain, gently.
"Yes, often and often. We do not even speak to each other sometimes, but I like to feel her close beside me, just as the other one sat, ages and ages ago. Who knows"--he laid a hand upon the captain's arm and sank his voice to a whisper--"who knows but that she is mine, come back, like a fairy child, in purity and innocence, to comfort me, and to tell me that all the rest has been a dream indeed? How else should she come to me? Yes, I like to think that--it comforts me."
The captain would not have stripped away that dream from the man for the world. He was so touched that he begged quite humbly that he might be permitted to come again to see him; and finally went out into the darkness and took his way homeward. But the captain was troubled in spirit, and the shining heavens above him did not seem to have quite the clear and fine message of peace that they had held so long for his simple soul. He took a circuitous route, and came again to the great dreary place where the child lived and looked in through the dilapidated gates. He sighed a little as he turned away, and whispered softly, "God keep you, baby--God keep you!"