"She laid her umbrella in the wet of the steps and, Silas being surprised into giving way, she stooped over the child. She woke him up neither by speaking to him nor grasping his arm, but she just slipped her hands along his cheeks till her hands met under his chin, and she lifted up his chin, gentle. "'Wake up and look at me,' she says. "The child opened his eyes, with no starting or bewildering, and looked straight up into her face. There was light enough for us all to see that he smiled bright, like one that's real glad some waiting is done. And she spoke to him, not making a point of it and bringing it out like she'd aimed it at him, but just matter-of-fact gentle and commonplace tender. "'Whose little boy are you?' she ask' him. "'I'm goin' with whoever wants me to go with 'em,' says the child. "'But who are you--where do you live?' she says to him. 'You live, don't you--in this town?' "The child shook his head positive. "'I lived far,' he told her, 'in that other place. I come up here with my daddy. He says he might not come back to-night.' "Robin Sidney knelt right down before him on the wet steps. "'Truly,' she said, 'haven't you any place to go to-night?' "'Oh, yes,' says the child, 'he says I must go with whoever wants me to go with 'em. Do--do you?' "At that Miss Sidney looked up at us, swift, and down again. The wind had took hold of a strand of her hair and blew it across her eyes, and she was pushing it away as she got up. And by then Insley was standing before her, back of the little boy, that he suddenly stooped down and picked up in his arms. "'Let's get inside, shall we?' he says, commanding. 'Let's all go back in and see about him.' "We went back into the church, even Silas taking orders, though of course that was part curiosity; and Insley sat down with the child on his knee, and held out the child's feet in his hand. "'He's wet as a rat,' he says. 'Look at his shoes.' "'Well-a, make him tell his name, why don't you?' says Mis' Sykes, sharp. '_I_ think we'd ought to find out who he is. What's your name, Boy?' she adds, brisk. "Insley dropped the boy's feet and took a-hold of one of his hands. 'Yes,' he says, hasty, 'we must try to do that.' But he looked right straight over Mis' Sykes's shoulder to where, beyond the others, Robin Sidney was standing. 'He was your friend first,' he said to her. 'You found him.' "She come and knelt down beside the child where, on Insley's knee, he sat staring round, all wondering and questioning, to the rest of us. But she seemed to forget all about the rest of us, and I loved the way she was with that little strange boy. She kind of put her hands on him, wiping the raindrops off his face, unbuttoning his wet coat, doing a little something to his collar; and every touch was a kind of a little stroke that some women's hands give almost without their knowing it. I loved to watch her, because I'm always as stiff as a board with a child--unless I'm alone with them. Then I ain't.