Herr Leonhardt stroked her hand, and spoke with the tenderness with which one speaks to a child. "During all these eighteen years that I have been such a care to you, and in all the thirty years of our marriage, you have never caused me an hour of suffering, and I have done what I could to aid and support you. You have borne bravely all our common misfortunes, followed our first children to the grave with me, and comforted me when I was overcome by despair. Do not let your courage fail you now, for I must give you pain. I cannot help it. Try, as you always have done, to spare me the pang of seeing you sink under it. Promise me this!" "For Heaven's sake, my husband, speak! I will promise you everything!" "What we have so long feared, dear wife, has at last come upon us!" He drew her nearer to him. "This morning when I awoke there was no daylight for me!" A dull, half-suppressed moan was heard at these words; then silence ensued. The old woman's hands slipped from her husband's,--he put his own out towards her, but she was not at his side. She had sunk down from her seat and buried her face in her arms, that he might not hear her sob. "Mother, where are you?" he asked after a little while. She embraced his knees and hid her streaming eyes in his lap. "Oh, my poor, kind husband,--blind! Oh God! Those dear, dear eyes!" And then her grief would not be controlled, and she lay at his feet, sobbing loudly. Herr Leonhardt gently raised her until her head rested upon his shoulder, and then waited until the first outbreak should be past. He too had had moments this morning that none but his God might witness. He could not ask his wife to do what had been impossible for himself. At last he said softly and tenderly, "Brigitta, you have been everything to me that a wife can be to her husband. I have always thought there was nothing left for you to do, and yet in your old age our loving Father has filled up the measure of your self-sacrifice and laid upon you a heavier burden than any you have yet had to bear. He has taken from me the power to support you, and calls upon you, a weary, aged pilgrim, to be your husband's staff upon his path to the grave. It seems very hard,--but, dear Brigitta, when God calls, what should we answer?" "Lord, here am I!" said his wife, and the resignation and cheerful submission in her voice were truly wonderful. She embraced her aged husband, and her tears flowed more gently as she said, "I will guide and support you, and never be weary." "Thanks, dear heart. And now be calm, for my sake! Think how much worse it would have been if you had found me this morning dead in my bed!" "Oh, a thousand times worse!"