I went in once. Mrs. Frost was alone, kneeling by the bed; I thought she must have been saying a prayer. Just then she lifted her head to look at him. As I backed away again, she began to speak aloud--and oh! what a sad tone she said it in! "The only son of his mother, and she was a widow!" There had to be an inquest. It did not come to much. The most that could be said was that he died from a kick at football. "A most unfortunate but an accidental kick," quoth the coroner. Tod had said that he saw the kick given: that is, had seen some foot come flat down with a bang on the side of little Hearn's head; and when Tod was asked if he recognized the foot, he replied No: boots looked very much alike, and a great many were thrust out in the skirmish, all kicking together. Not one would own to having given it. For the matter of that, the fellow might not have been conscious of what he did. No end of thoughts glanced towards Barrington: both because he was so ferocious at the game, and that he had a spite against Hearn. "I never touched him," said Barrington, when this leaked out; and his face and voice were boldly defiant. "It wasn't me. I never so much as saw that Hearn was down." And as there were others quite as brutal at football as Barrington, he was believed. We could not get over it any way. It seemed so dreadful that he should have been left alone to die. Hall was chiefly to blame for that; and it cowed her. "Look here," said Tod to us, "I have a message for one of you. Whichever the cap fits may take it to himself. When Hearn was dying he told me to say that he forgave the fellow who kicked him." This was the evening of the inquest-day. We had all gathered in the porch by the stone bench, and Tod took the opportunity to relate what he had not related before. He repeated every word that Hearn had said. "Did Hearn know who it was, then?" asked John Whitney. "I think so." "Then why didn't you ask him to name him!" "Why didn't I ask him to name him," repeated Tod, in a fume. "Do you suppose I thought he was going to die, Whitney?--or that the kick was to turn out a serious one? Hearn was growing big enough to fight his own battles: and I never thought but he would be up again at supper-time." John Whitney pushed his hair back, in his quiet, thoughtful way, and said no more. He was to die, himself, the following year--but that has nothing to do with the present matter. I was standing away at the gate after this, looking at the sunset, when Tod came up and put his arms on the top bar. "What are you gazing at, Johnny?" "At the sunset. How red it is! I was thinking that if Hearn's up there now he is better off. It is very beautiful." "I should not like to have been the one to send him there, though," was Tod's answer. "Johnny, I am certain Hearn knew who it was," he went on in a low tone. "I am certain he thought the fellow, himself, knew, and that it had been done for the purpose. I think I know also."