To humor him Mr. De Jarnette threw the comforter across his knees, conveniently spread apart. Philip dropped his head upon the manufactured substitute to its immediate undoing. "My mama's lap don't come to pieces," he remarked critically. "Wait till I get this thing under my feet," retorted his uncle. "I ought to be able to make a lap that will stand you. Now, sir, I'm ready for you." It sounded like a challenge. His nephew, hungry for a romp, made a battering ram of himself and again the lap caved in. When it was reconstructed, Philip put his head down very gently, increasing the pressure with every word. "Now I lay me down to sleep, I pway Thee, Lord, my soul--" There was a gurgle of laughter down in the comforter. "Unker Wichard, it's giving way!" "Philip, you rascal! You're making it give way. Wait! Now I've got it!" With the comforter under both feet he made a lap that could withstand a small boy even, and Philip, recognizing the fact that his romp was over, folded his hands and bowed his head, saying reverently the sweet prayer that so many infant lips have lisped: "Now I lay me down to sleep; I pray Thee, Lord, my soul to keep; If I should die before I wake, I pray Thee, Lord, my soul to take. And this I ask for Jesus' sake, Amen." It came into Richard De Jarnette's mind as he sat thus what a ridiculous figure he would cut if any of his business friends should see him at this moment. And yet, strange to say, the situation was not all ludicrous to him. He had never listened to a child's prayers before. "Good-night, Philip," he said, softly. Philip raised his head but made no motion to raise. "I'm not through yet. I haven't said the 'God bless 'em'." Then lowering his curly head again he repeated in an entirely conversational tone: "God bless my mama and bwing her back to her _dear_ little boy; and God bless Gwanma Pennybacker; and God bless Bess and make her a good girl; and God bless Mammy Cely and make her white--be _sure_ to make her white, cause she wants to be, and you forgot her druthers when you made her; and God bless Uncle Wichard, and take away his stony heart." He stopped suddenly, thinking that perhaps he ought not to have said this. "Where did you hear that, Philip?" "My mama said so. Unker Wichard, what is a stony heart?" Richard De Jarnette laughed a rather mirthless laugh, but did not answer the question. "I suppose your mama has told you a number of pleasant things about me," he said, and his tone had an infusion of bitterness in it. The opinion of this midget was becoming important to him. "She said she didn't believe that anything would _ever_ change your heart; but Gwanma Pennybacker said God could do anything--He could change it--and I must ask Him every night to take away your stony heart and give you a--a--" he was trying very hard to recall the words--"a heart--of--_I_ don't know--somefin'--but it wasn't stone."