"No," said little Miles, meekly, "but you'll tell me, Humphie?" "To-morrow," he murmured, "I shall be able to explain--better--to-morrow--good-night--good-night." And in the silence that reigned, every one present heard the little brothers exchange their last kiss. * * * * * * * * "I can't see them," said Sir Everard, huskily; "some one draw up the blind." The setting sun outside was illumining the landscape ere it sank to rest, and shedding its beams on the haunts and the companions of the boy's young life. On the lambs he had chased in the meadows, on the birds he had watched since they had learned to fly, on the fields and the gardens which seemed so empty without him, it was shining with a softened glow;--but it seemed to have reserved its richest glory for the children, for, as the blind went slowly up, such a flood of light poured into the room, that the eyes of the father were dazzled, and it was some minutes before he could distinguish them. There, in the golden sunset, they lay. The sun kissed their little faces, and touched with a loving hand their curly hair. It lingered lovingly round them, as if it knew that the lambs would be frisking when it rose again, the birds would welcome it with their glad song; but that never again would it rest on the nestling forms and clasped hands of the two little brothers! Sir Everard, bending over them, saw a troubled expression over Humphrey's face. "What can it be that ails the child?" he mentally questioned; "is it physical pain, or is something troubling his thoughts? Is the fear of death coming over him?" He did not like to speak for fear of disturbing him, but as the look deepened almost to pain, he could not restrain himself any longer. "Humphrey, my darling," he exclaimed, in his longing to do something, be it ever so little, to soothe his boy's dying hour, "what is it? What can I do for you?" Nothing! With all his love and all his yearning, nothing! For surging once more in the boy's brain is the noise as of rushing and singing, and with its sound a fear has risen in his breast. Shall he ever, ever catch the music of that wondrous song? Doubts of his own power to learn it are troubling his wandering thoughts; dim misgivings that _children_ can not learn it, founded on his own inability to follow the singing in church. Always too soon or too late! _Do_ children ever learn it? "'And no _man_ could learn that song save the hundred and forty and four ...' nothing about children _there_!" Vain is the father's endeavor to reach a trouble of this kind; vainly, bending over him, does he seek to discover its cause, in his longings to remove or alleviate it.