The boy's upturned face was pale, and his eyes, tearless as her own had been, were fastened in an agony upon hers.

She could not soothe or comfort him, for she knew his grief was wasted on a falsehood; but she looked down on her son's face with a feeling of terror.
"Oh, my father! my beloved father!" he sobbed at last.

"Is he dead, mother?
You never told me anything that wasn't true.

He can't be dead, though Phebe says so.

Is it true, mother ?" Felicita bent her head till it rested on the boy's uplifted face.