“My love, you are beautiful, for your heart is kind. We all love you so very much. And one day, when you are older, some one will come to you, some one to whom I talk now as I talk to you, and he will tell you that you are beautiful. He is great friends with the owl, who calls to him at night. But at present he is only a little boy.” “How lovely,” Jo cried, jumping up and dancing. “Will he be long in coming? And will he have a horse, and a sword, and a squire to take off his armour?” “One day he will have a sword, and he will be brave although his heart may be heavy. And when that is over, he will be sad for a long time, but always brave. But that is years to come. Sometimes even now he is sad, for his mother is dead, and his father thinks that he will grow up wild. Yet he is often jolly and naughty, especially with his friends in a wood. His name is Willie, and he is nine years old.” “I must be beautiful when he sees me,” said the child-woman, “or he will go away.” “He will only go away if you do not want him,” twittered the swallow, preening his feathers, “and one day he will need you very badly.” “Oh, but I shall want my little boy,” she said, “and when I meet him I will tell him I’m his friend. But I am ugly,” and her eyes filled with tears. “My love,” breathed the swallow, perching on her shoulder, “I have a gift for you, which I give gladly. It is all I have, and soon the meadow grasses will fall, and the roses on the hedges, and then we will be told by the wind that we must go again over the great sea into which so many of us fall. I shall have to die soon, so it does not matter,” he added to himself, but Jo did not hear, for she was wondering what the gift would be. “Good-bye, dear,” whispered the swallow presently, “and do not forget us when you grow up. So many do.” “No, swallow, no, but come back soon, and give my little boy a kiss for me, because he hasn’t any mummy.” The swallow rose high in the air, and in gay flight sped over the cornfield; a swift brown bird dashed after him; a few light feathers danced in the air; a tiny poppy suddenly bloomed on a bended flag of wheat. “O swallow,” wept the child. “O little, little swallow.” Her heart still murmured with sadness as she went down the path towards home, past Great-uncle Sufford and a strange man, both painting at their easels. Jo wanted to look at his picture, but she thought that he might think her rude. At first he frightened her when he jumped up and exclaimed, “Oh, let me sketch your head, little lady. Beautiful, glorious!” speaking rapidly to himself, “such an angle, and glorious uplift!” But his eyes looked kind, and already she liked him. And Great-uncle Sufford was laughing. “Don’t be frightened,” he said, “but just let Mr. Norman sketch your forehead. My child, I have only just noticed it. You have the most perfect brows I have ever seen, blue-black like a swallow wing, and such an angle! Norman, you must make your picture worthy of Jo.”