That evening when she presented herself at the hospital the nurse met her outside the door with her finger to her lips. "She is sinking, but conscious." Confronted with her emergency, Lilly stood before that closed door, beating all over with her silent little prayer: "O God, help me! Help me, help her!" Mrs. Schum was quite conscious. "Lilly," she said, reaching out a thin old hand that was covered with veins as round as cables, "I've been waiting." "Here I am, dear." "I think I'm done, Lilly. I--dream so much--of God." "Why, you're better, dear!" "No. I'm going. I wanted so to wait for my boy. The doctor, can't he help me to wait, Lilly? Ask him to help me to wait. I keep thinking he's over there somewhere--Harry--funny isn't it? Over there waiting. You've heard no news, Lilly?" In this moment more propitious than she dared hope Lilly leaned over. "Yes, dear, there is news." "Harry?" she said quickly and sharply, lifting her head. "Yes, dear--Harry--is--over there--waiting." "His Mamma-Annie's boy--they were all against him. He can't stay back here alone--he needs me, doctor--help me to wait for him--" "Listen, dear--Harry's gone." "Where?" "Why--over there--just as your intuition told you." She pulled at the sheet with fingers as fleshless as the feet of a bird, moving her lips, vainly at first, and suddenly jerked herself up with a strength no doctor would have conceded her. "He's dead, Lilly. My boy's dead. Please--please--it is so--isn't it? My boy's dead?" "Yes." "I knew it. Oh, Annie, you're the mother of a soldier. God wouldn't let me leave him back here--alone. I wouldn't have left him. There wasn't any good ahead for him. That's why I wanted him to die like a soldier. Before he should come to the bad places ahead. I can go so easy now. I'm done. God fixed it for me--Lilly." She held the racked old form to her, kissed away tears that the washed old eyes could hardly yield, made a couch of her arms, and held her close so that their heartbeats met. "Lilly, I feel so easy. I never felt so easy." "Lie quietly, dear." "Life can be hard, Lilly. And now--war. Make it easier for yourself. Don't let him out there--go over there--anywhere--reproaching. Your parents--your child--it's his as much as yours, Lilly. If I had gone first, my boy would have reproached. There is nothing so terrible, Lilly--as eyes that reproach--eyes--Lilly--don't." "I--won't." She drifted off then in the placidity of a sleep from which she was not to emerge. * * * * * Lilly walked home that early morning following. Her direction lay in a straight line through Central Park. Spring was out in firstlings of every kind. The baby nap of new grass. Trees ready to quiver into leaf. The sun came up from behind a sky line of skyscrapers, and as she was crossing the Mall a fountain rained up a first joyous geyser, some sparrows immediately plunging for a bath.