face looked
like the face of a man who had come off a battle-field where victory had
been almost as terrible as defeat. As soon as he saw old Ike running
across the field towards him, he divined all.

"Loving old heart!" he thought, "Draxy was right," and he held out both
his hands to the old man as he had never done before, and spoke a few
affectionate words, which made tears run down the wrinkled cheeks. Then he
sent him on the errand he knew he craved.

"You'd better give the news first to Eben Hill, Ike," he called after him.
"It'll be of more use to him than to anybody in the parish."

It was just two years from Draxy's wedding day, when she stood again in
the aisle of the little village church, dressed in pure white, with the
southern sunlight resting on her beautiful hair. Her husband stood by her
side, holding their infant son in his arms. The child had clear, calm blue
eyes like Draxy's, and an expression of serenity and radiant joy on his
tiny face, which made the people wonder.

"Reuben Miller Kinney" was his name; and though the parish had hoped that
the child would be named for his father, when they looked at Reuben
Miller's sweet, patient, noble face, and saw its intense happiness as the
words were spoken, they felt that it was better so.

Again swift months rolled on, and peace and joy brooded over the
parsonage. Draxy's life with her child was something too beautiful to be
told in words; her wifehood was lovely, was intense; but her motherhood
was greater. Day and night her love for her boy protected and guided him,
like pillar of cloud, like pillar of fire. She knew no weariness, no
feebleness; she grew constantly stronger and more beautiful, and the child
grew stronger and more beautiful, with a likeness to her and a oneness
with her which were marvelous. He was a loving and affectionate boy to
all; his father, his grandparents, old Ike, and swarthy Hannah,--all alike
sunned themselves in the delight of his beautiful childhood. But wherever
he was--however amused and delighted--even in his father's arms--his eyes
sought his mother's eyes, and the mute interchange between them was subtle
and constant as between lovers. There was but one drawback on Draxy's
felicity now. She was afraid of her love for her boy.

"O Seth!" she said,--after little Reuben's birth she for the first time
called her husband by this name; before that, although she lavished on him
all words of endearment, she had never found