e-open, curiously intent blue eyes.

"Is he coming? Did you get him? Will he play?" called the boy at the
window eagerly.

"Yes, I'm right here. I'm the one. Can't you see the violin? Shall I
play here or come in?" answered David, not one whit less eagerly.

The small girl opened her lips as if to explain something; but the boy
in the window did not wait.

"Oh, come in. WILL you come in?" he cried unbelievingly. "And will you
just let me touch it--the fiddle? Come! You WILL come? See, there isn't
anybody home, only just Betty and me."

"Of course I will!" David fairly stumbled up the broken steps in his
impatience to reach the wide-open door. "Did you like it--what I
played? And did you know what I was playing? Did you understand? Could
you see the cloud-boats up in the sky, and my Silver Lake down in the
valley? And could you hear the birds, and the winds in the trees, and
the little brooks? Could you? Oh, did you understand? I've so wanted to
find some one that could! But I wouldn't think that YOU--HERE--" With a
gesture, and an expression on his face that were unmistakable, David
came to a helpless pause.

"There, Joe, what'd I tell you," cried the little girl, in a husky
whisper, darting to her brother's side. "Oh, why did you make me get
him here? Everybody says he's crazy as a loon, and--"

But the boy reached out a quickly silencing hand. His face was
curiously alight, as if from an inward glow. His eyes, still widely
intent, were staring straight ahead.

"Stop, Betty, wait," he hushed her. "Maybe--I think I DO understand.
Boy, you mean--INSIDE of you, you see those things, and then you try to
make your fiddle tell what you are seeing. Is that it?"

"Yes, yes," cried David. "Oh, you DO understand. And I never thought
you could. I never thought that anybody could that did n't have
anything to look at but him--but these things."

"'Anything but these to look at'!" echoed the boy, with a sudden
anguish in his voice. "Anything but these! I guess if I could see
ANYTHING, I wouldn't mind WHAT I see! An' you wouldn't, neither, if you
was--blind, like me."

"Blind!" David fell back. Face and voice were full of horror. "You mean
you can't see--anything, with your eyes?"

"Nothin'."

"Oh! I never saw any one blind before. There was one in a book--but
father took it away. Since then, in books down here, I've found
others--but--"

"Yes, yes. Well, never mind that," cut in the blind boy, growing
restive und