When he woke it was already clear daylight and the sparrows were making a great racket and his first disappointed thought was that he was too late, though he could not yet think what it was he was too late for. But something special was on his mind which made him eager and happy almost as if this were Christmas morning and within a second after waking he remembered what it was and, sitting up, his lungs stretching full with anticipation and pride, he put his hand into the crisp tissue paper with a small smashing noise and took out the cap. There was plenty of light to see the colors well; he quickly turned it around and over, and smelled of the new cloth and of the new leather band. He put it on and yanked the hill down firmly and pelted down the hallway calling “Daddy! Daddy!”, and burst through the open door into their bedroom; then brought up short in dismay, for his father was not there. But his mother lay there, propped up on two pillows as if she were sick. She looked sick, or very tired, and in her eyes she seemed to be afraid of him. Her face was full of little lines he had never seen before; they were as small as the lines in her mended best teacup. She put out her arms towards him and made in odd, kind noise. “Where’s Daddy?” he shouted imperiously ignoring her arms. “Daddy—isn’t here yet,” she told him, in a voice like hot ashes, and her arms sank down along the sheet.

“Where is he, then!” he demanded, in angry disappointment, but she thrust through these words with her own: “Go wake—little Catherine and bring her straight here,” she said in a voice which puzzled him; “there’s something I must tell you both together.”

He was darting his eyes everywhere for clues of his father. clothes? watch? tobacco? nightshirt? “Right away,” she said, in a desperate voice.

Startled by its mysterious rebuke, and uneasy in his stomach because she had said “little Catherine,” he hurried out—and all but collided with his Aunt Hannah. Her mouth was strong and tightly pressed together beneath her glittering spectacles as she stooped, peering forward.

“Hello, Aunt Hannah,” he called with astonishment, as he sped around and past her; he saw her go into the bedroom, her hair sticking out from her thin neck in two twiggy braids; he hurried to Catherine’s crib.

“Wake up, Catherine!” he yelled, “Mama says wake up! Right away!”

“Stobbit,” she bawled, her round, red face glaring.

“Well Mama said so, Mama said so, wake up!”

And a few moments later he hurried back ahead of her and hollered breathlessly, “She’s coming!” and she trailed in, two-thirds asleep, snuffling with anger, her lower lip stuck out.

“Take off that cap!” his Aunt Hannah snapped with frightening sternness, and his hands only just caught it against her snatching. He was appalled by this inexplicable betrayal, and the hardness of her mouth as she struggled with self-astonishment and repentance was even more ominous.

“Oh, Hannah, no, let him,” his mother said in her strange voice, “he was so crazy for Jay to see it,” and even as she said it he was surprised all over again for his aunt, whispering something inaudible, touched his cheek very gently. And now as she had done before, his mother lifted forward her hands and her kind arms. “Children, come close,” she said.

Aunt Hannah went silently out of the room.

“Come close”; and she touched each of them. “I want to tell you about Daddy.” But upon his name her voice shook and her whole dry-looking mouth trembled like the ash of burned paper in a draft. “Can you hear me, Catherine?” she asked, when she had recovered her voice. Catherine peered at her earnestly as if through a thick fog. “Are you waked up enough yet, my darling?” And because of her voice, in sympathy and for her protection, they both came now much nearer, and she put her arms around both of them, and they could smell her breath, a little like sauerkraut but more like a dried-up mouse. And now even more small lines like cracked china branched all over her face. “Daddy,” she said, “your father, children”: and this time she caught control of her mouth more quickly, and a single tear spilled out of her left eye and slid jaggedly down all the jagged lines: “Daddy didn’t come home. He isn’t going to come home ever any more. He’s—gone away to heaven and he isn’t ever coming home again. Do you hear me, Catherine? Are you awake?” Catherine stared at her mother. “Do you understand, Rufus?”

He stared at his mother. “Why not?” he asked.

She looked at him with extraordinary closeness and despair, and said, “Because God wanted him.” They continued to stare at her severely and she went on: “Daddy was on his way home last night—and he was—he—got hurt and—so God let him go to sleep and took him straight away with Him to heaven.” She sank her fingers in Catherine’s springy hair and looked intently from one to the other. “Do you see, children? Do you understand?” They stared at her, and now Catherine was sharply awake.

“Is Daddy dead?” Rufus asked.............