The room was darkening fast, but still across the nether end, by the foot of the bed, streamed the dull red bar of sunlight with the little red figure leaping and prancing and laughing in the midst of it.
With an awful cry Ruth fell back on the pillow and turned her eyes to the wall.

The black woman dropped her head that she might not see.

And Israel covered his face and groaned in his tearless agony, "O Lord God, long hast Thou chastised me with whips, and now I am chastised with scorpions!" Ruth recovered herself quickly.

"Bring her to me again!" she faltered; and once more Fatimah brought Naomi back to the bedside.

Then, embracing and kissing the child, and seeming to forget in the torment of her trouble that Naomi could not hear her, she cried, "It's your mother, Naomi! your mother, darling, though so sick and changed! Don't you know her, Naomi?
Your mother, your own mother, sweet one, your dear mother who loves you so, and must leave you now and see you no more!" Now what it was in that wild plea that touched the consciousness of the child at last, only God Himself can say.