"No!" he cried fiercely, "there is a God. He will not take all from me." He went back into the car and, kneeling beside his sleeping wife, prayed madly to his God for mercy. The grasses were green along the tracks, and the blue violets lifted their rain-washed faces as the familiar stations loomed in sight near the journey's end. At the last station below Bloomtown, Bill and Dr. Hall entered the sleeper. "We have everything arranged," Dr. Hall said to Jap, while Bill fought with his tears. "Isabel Granger has gone through too much to stand the harrowing experience of a funeral. The carriages are waiting, and it has all been attended to at the cemetery. We'll just have a short service out there, and I want you to keep her in the carriage with you. Bill and I did things with a high hand, but it had to be so. I wouldn't risk having the girl look into her mother's grave. She couldn't stand it." The platform was crowded with friends, and Tom Granger was responding to sympathetic greetings with tears he did not try to hold. Jap half carried Isabel to the nearest carriage, and Dr. Hall took his place with them. Bill had hurried to meet Mabelle, who tactfully drew Tom Granger into the second carriage, in which the minister sat waiting. In a dream the well known landmarks of Bloomtown passed before Jap's eyes. There was the quick jolt that marked the crossing of the railroad tracks, and then the cool green of the cemetery came into view. While the brief service was read, Jap held Isabel tight to his aching breast. His eyes wandered away beyond the yellow mound of earth, and in the hazy distance he saw his City of Hope. The young grass smiled above the mounds that held the empty shells of those he had loved, the first in all the world who had loved him. On Flossy's straight white shaft he read "I Hope." That was all. After the slow cortege had moved its way back to town, Mabelle left the carriage and approached her brother. Bill, with his face frankly tear-stained, was beside her. The coachman had descended from his box, and was opening the door. "Let me take her--let me take your sweetheart to our cottage," she pleaded. Leaning past him, she took one of Isabel's black-gloved hands. "Dear, I am Jappie's sister. I want to have you with me until you are better." Tom Granger sat up and leaned out of the carriage, so that all could hear him. "Jap is coming home with us," he said. "He is my son. He was married to Isabel just before her mother left us." And it was thus that after well-nigh three years of waiting Bloomtown celebrated the long-expected happiness of her best loved son. CHAPTER XXV