"I stay because I hope and pray that, by dwelling near it, I may catch a glimpse of my only son; that I may hear his voice speak to me, or feel for a moment the warm, clinging touch of his little hands. I stay because I crave for a message from him, to tell me that he loves me still." Then there was pity in the wise man's eyes, and it was the sweet pity of a mother who sees a child cry over a broken toy. "Your son has many messages far you," he said, "but you cannot find or read them here; and, if you stay, your eyes will soon grow too dim to see, and the darkness will hold itself all about your heart. Turn your face and footsteps back to your people and your king, and seek there a message from your son which shall speak of consolation." The Queen was silent then, and her feet and hands were still. She looked up at the wise, quiet man, and, as she looked, she saw that his eyes were like those of the child who had passed away, and she caught at the hem of his robe with trembling fingers. [Illustration: "My sentence is--Forgiveness!"] "Who are you?" she cried. "Who are you, with your wise words, and your eyes like those of my son, who was but a little, little child?" Then into the face of the man came a wonderful look, so that the Queen, seeing it, bent her head and bowed her forehead upon her hands. And it seemed to her, for a moment, as if strange sweet scents blew to her, and the darkness broke away into long alleys of light and bloom. And then there was a hush, and when she looked up again the wise man was gone. But she remembered that he had given her the sweetest promise in the world--the promise of a message from her only son; and, believing him, she went away from the belt of darkness, and turned again to the palace, to her children, and to her king. And as she passed along the road she came across a poor cripple who had fallen and hurt himself by the way. His wounds bled, and he looked up at the Queen with wistful eyes. So she went, herself, to the nearest stream to fetch water for him, and she gave him some to drink, and bound up the poor bruises, and soothed him with gentle words. And as she tended him, she forgot for a moment the darkness into which her son had passed, and only remembered that the land, in spite of its beauty, was full of suffering and tears, and that she had her work to do among her people; and she looked with her shining mother's eyes into the cripple's face, and bade him be comforted. And then, all at once, a wonderful thing happened. The cripple spoke, in faltering tones, to thank her; and his voice thrilled her, for it was the voice of her little son.