And, as the words fell like sweet music upon
our ears, the old man sat with eyes that looked far away, while the
child listened with devouring eagerness.
"Is it a fairy tale, daddy?" she asked, as The Pilot paused. "It isn't
true, is it?" and her voice had a pleading note hard for the old man to
bear.
"Yes, yes, my child," said he, brokenly. "God forgive me!"
"Of course it's true," said The Pilot, quickly. "I'll read it all to you
to-morrow. It's a beautiful story!"
"No," she said, imperiously, "to-night. Read it now! Go on!" she said,
stamping her foot, "don't you hear me?"
The Pilot gazed in surprise at her, and then turning to the old man,
said:
"Shall I?"
The Old Timer simply nodded and the reading went on. Those were not my
best days, and the faith of my childhood was not as it had been; but, as
The Pilot carried us through those matchless scenes of self-forgetting
love and service the rapt wonder in the child's face as she listened,
the appeal in her voice as, now to her father, and now to me, she
cried: "Is THAT true, too? Is it ALL true?" made it impossible for me
to hesitate in my answer. And I was glad to find it easy to give my firm
adherence to the truth of all that tale of wonder. And, as more and more
it grew upon The Pilot that the story he was reading, so old to him and
to all he had ever met, was new to one in that listening group, his face
began to glow and his eyes to blaze, and he saw and showed me things
that night I had never seen before, nor have I seen them since.
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