So the boy prayed silently; and after his prayer he was about lingeringly to close the lattice, when he heard distinctly sobs close at hand. He paused, and held his breath; then gently looked out; the casement next his own was also open. Some one was also at watch by that casement--perhaps also praying. He listened yet more attentively, and caught, soft and low, the words. "Father--father--do you hear me _now_?" CHAPTER VI. Leonard opened his door and stole towards that of the room adjoining; for his first natural impulse had been to enter and console. But when his touch was on the handle, he drew back. Child, though the mourner was, her sorrows were rendered yet more sacred from intrusion by her sex. Something, he knew not what, in his young ignorance, withheld him from the threshold. To have crossed it then would have seemed to him profanation. So he returned, and for hours yet he occasionally heard the sobs, till they died away, and childhood wept itself to sleep. But the next morning, when he heard his neighbor astir, he knocked gently at her door: there was no answer. He entered softly, and saw her seated very listlessly in the centre of the room--as if it had no familiar nook or corner as the rooms of home have--her hands drooping on her lap, and her eyes gazing desolately on the floor. Then he approached and spoke to her. Helen was very subdued, and very silent. Her tears seemed dried up; and it was long before she gave sign or token that she heeded him. At length, however, he gradually succeeded in rousing her interest; and the first symptom of his success was in the quiver of her lip, and the overflow of the downcast eyes.