Mr. Wheeler sighed. Why was it that a man could not tell his children
what he had learned,--that nothing was so great as one expected; that
love was worth living for, but not dying for. The impatience of youth
for life! It had killed Jim. It was hurting Nina. It would all come,
all come, in God's good time. The young did not live to-day, but always
to-morrow. There seemed no time to live to-day, for any one. First one
looked ahead and said, "I will be so happy." And before one knew it one
was looking back and saying: "I was so happy."

"She'll be all right," he said aloud.

He got up and whistled for the dog.

"I'll take him around the block before I lock up," he said heavily. He
bent over and kissed his wife. She was a sad figure to him in her black
dress. He did not say to her what he thought sometimes; that Jim had
been saved a great deal. That to live on, and to lose the things one
loved, one by one, was harder than to go quickly, from a joyous youth.

He had not told her what he knew about Jim's companion that night. She
would never have understood. In her simple and child-like faith she
knew that her boy sat that day among the blessed company of heaven. He
himself believed that Jim had gone forgiven into whatever lay behind the
veil we call death, had gone shriven and clean before the Judge who knew
the urge of youth and life. He did not fear for Jim. He only missed him.