Murray was not as one without hope, for there was the Promise. The remembrance of it set him now to exulting¹, in an odd, restrained little way, where a moment ago he had been desponding. He clasped plump, brown little hands around a plump, brown little knee and swayed gently this way and that.  
“Maybe she’ll begin with my shoes,” Murray thought, and held his foot quite still. He could almost feel light fingers unlacing the stubbed little shoe; Sheelah’s fingers were rather heavy and not patient with knots. Hers would be patient—there are some things one is certain of.
 
“When she unbuttons me,” Murray mused² on, sitting absolutely motionless, as if she were unbuttoning him now—“when she unbuttons me I shall hold in my breath—this way,” though he could hardly have explained why.
 
She had never unlaced or unbuttoned him. Always, since he was a little, breathing soul, it had been Sheelah. It had never occurred to him that he loved Sheelah, but he was used to her. All the mothering he had ever experienced had been the Sheelah kind—thorough enough, but lacking something; Murray was conscious that it lacked something. Perhaps—perhaps to-night he should find out what. For to-night not Sheelah, but his mother, was going to undress him and put him to bed. She had promised.
 
It had come about through his unprecedented³ wail⁴ of grief at parting, when she had gone into the nursery to say good-bye, in her light, sweet way. Perhaps it was because she was to be gone all day; perhaps he was a little lonelier than usual. He was always rather a lonely little boy, but there were worse times; perhaps this had been a worse time. Whatever had been the reason that prompted him, he had with disquieting⁵ suddenness, before Sheelah could prevent it, flung his arms about the pretty mother and made audible objection to her going.
 
“Why, Murray!” She had been taken by surprise. “Why, you little silly! I’m coming back to-night; I’m only going for the day! You wouldn’t see much more of me if I stayed at home.” Which, from its very reasonableness, had quieted him. Of course he would not see much more of her. As suddenly as he had wailed⁶ he stopped wailing⁷. Yet she had promised. Something had sent her back to the nursery door to do it.
 
“Be a good boy and I’ll come home before you go to bed! I’ll put you to bed,” she had promised. “We’ll have a regular lark⁸!”
 
Hence he was out here on the door-step being a good boy. That Sheelah had taken unfair advantage of the Promise and made the being good rather a perilous⁹ undertaking¹⁰, he did not appreciate. He only knew he must walk a narrow path across a long, lonely day.
 
There were certain things—one especial certain thing—he wanted to know, but instinct warned him not to interrupt Sheelah till her work was done, or she might call it not being good. So he waited, and while he waited he found out the special thing. An unexpected providence¹¹ sent enlightenment his way, to sit down beside him on the door-step. Its other name was Daisy.
 
“Hullo, Murray! Is it you?” Daisy, being of the right sex, asked needless questions sometimes.
 
“Yes,” answered Murray, politely.
 
“Well, le’s play. I can stay half a hour. Le’s tag.”
 
“I can’t play,” rejoined Murray, caution restraining his natural desires. “I’m being good.”
“Oh, my!” shrilled¹² the girl child derisively¹³. “Can’t you be good tagging? Come on.”
 
“No; because you might—I might get no-fairing, and then Sheelah’d come out and say I was bad. Le’s sit here and talk; it’s safer to. What’s a lark, Daisy? I was going to ask Sheelah.”
 
“A—lark? Why, it’s a bird, of course!”
 
“I don’t mean the bird kind, but the kind you have when your mother puts you—when something splendid happens. That kind, I mean.”
 
Daisy pondered. Her acquaintance with larks¹⁴ was limited, unless it meant—
 
“Do you mean a good time?” she asked. “We have larks over to my house when we go to bed—”
 
“That’s it! That’s the kind!” shouted delighted Murray. “I’m going to have one when I go to bed. Do you have reg’lar ones, Daisy?” with a secret little hope that she didn’t. “I’m going to have a reg’lar one.”
 
“Huh!—chase all ’round the room an’ turn somersaults an’ be highway robberers? An’ take the hair-pins out o’ your mother’s hair an’ hide in it—what?”
 
Murray gasped¹⁵ a little at the picture of that kind of a lark. It was difficult to imagine himself chasing ’round the room or being a highwayman; and as for somersaults—he glanced uneasily over his shoulder, as if Sheelah might be looking and read “somersaults” through the back of his head. For once he had almost turned one and Sheelah had found him in the middle of it and said pointed¹⁶ things. In Sheelah’s code of etiquette¹⁷ there were no somersaults in the “s” column.
 
“It’s a reg’lar lark to hide in your mother’s hair,” was going on the girl child’s voice. “Yes, sir, that’s the reg’larest kind!”
 
Murray gasped again, harder. For that kind took away his breath altogether and made him feel a little dizzy, as if he were—were doing it now—hiding in his mother’s hair! It was soft, beautiful, gold-colored hair, and there was a great deal of it—oh, plenty to hide in! He shut his eyes and felt it all about him and soft against his face, and smelled the faint fragrance¹⁸ of it. The dizziness was sweet.
 
Yes, that must be the reg’larest kind of a lark, but Murray did not deceive himself, once the dream was over. He knew that kind was not waiting for him at the end of this long day. But a lark was waiting, anyway—a plain lark. It might have been the bird kind in his little heart now, singing for joy at the prospect¹⁹.
 
Impatience²⁰ seized upon Murray. He wanted this little neighbor’s half-hour to be up, so that he could go in and watch the clock. He wanted Sheelah to come out here, for that would mean it was ten o’clock; she always came at ten. He wanted it to be noon, to be afternoon, to be night! The most beautiful time in his rather monotonous²¹ little life was down there at the foot of the day, and he was creeping towards it on the lagging hours. He was like a little traveller on a dreary²² plain, with the first ecstatic glimpse of a hill ahead.
 
Murray in his childish way had been in love a long time, but he had never got very near his dear lady. He had watched her a little way off and wondered at the gracious beauty of her, and loved her eyes and her lips and her soft, gold-colored hair. He had never—oh, never—been near enough to be unlaced and unbuttoned and put to bed by the lady that he loved. She had come in sometimes in a wondrous²³ dress to say good night, but often, stopping at the mirror on the way across to him, she had seen a beautiful vision and forgotten to say it. And Murray had not wondered, for he had seen the vision, too.
“Your mamma’s gone away, hasn’t she? I saw her.”
 
Daisy was still there! Murray pulled himself out of his dreaming, to be polite.
 
“Yes; but she’s coming back to-night. She promised.”
 
“S’posing the cars run off the track so she can’t?” Daisy said, cheerfully.
 
“She’ll come,” Murray rejoined, with the decision of faith. “She promised, I said.”
 
“S’posing she’s killed ’most dead?”
 
“She’ll come.”
 
“Puffickly dead—s’posing?”
 
Murray took time, but even here his faith in the Promise stood its ground, though the ground shook under it. Sheelah had taught him what a promise was; it was something not to be shaken or killed even in a railroad wreck²⁴.
 
“When anybody promises, they do it,” he said, sturdily. “She promised an’ she’ll come.”
 
“Then her angel will have to come,” remarked the older, girl child, coolly, with awful use of the indicative mood.
 
When the half-hour was over and Murray at liberty, he went in to the clock and stood before it with hands a-pocket and wide-spread legs. A great yearning²⁵ was upon him to know the mystery of telling time. He wished—oh, how he wished he had let Sheelah teach him! Then he could have stood here making little addition sums and finding out just how long it would be till night. Or he could go away and keep coming back here to make little subtraction²⁶ sums, to find out how much time was left now—and now—and now. It was dreadful to just stand and wonder things.
 
Once he went up-stairs to his own little room out of the nursery and sat down where he had always sat when Sheelah unlaced him, before he had begun to unlace himself, and stood up where he had always stood when Sheelah unbuttoned him. He sat very still and stood very still, his grave little face intent with imagining. He was imagining how it would be when she did it. She would be right here, close—if he dared, he could put out his hand and smooth her. If he dared, he could take the pins out of her soft hair, and hide in it—
 
He meant to dare!
 
“Little silly,” perhaps she would call him; perhaps she would remember to kiss him good-night. And afterwards, when the lark was over, it would stay on, singing in his heart. And he would lie in the dark and love Her.
 
For Her part, it was a busy day enough and did not lag. She did her shopping and called on a town friend or two. In the late afternoon she ran in to several art-stores where pictures were on exhibition. It was at the last of these places that she chanced to meet a woman who was a neighbor of hers in the suburbs.
 
“Why, Mrs. Cody!” the neighbor cried. “How delightful²⁷! You’ve come in to see Irving, too?”
 
“No,” with distinct regret answered Murray’s mother, “but I wish I had! I’m only in for a little shopping.”
 
“Not going to stay! Why, it will be wicked to go back to-night—unless, of course, you’ve seen him in Robespierre.”
 
“I haven’t. Cicely Howe has been teasing me to stop over and go with her. It’s a ‘sure-enough’ temptation, as Fred says. Fred’s away, so that part’s all right. Of course there’s Murray, but there’s also Sheelah—” She was talking more to herself now than to the neighbor. The temptation had taken a sudden and striking hold upon her. It was the chance of a lifetime. She really ought—
 
“I guess you’ll stop over!” laughed the neighbor. “I know the signs.”
 
“I’ll telephone to Sheelah,” Murray’s mother decided²⁸, aloud, “then I’ll run along back to Cicely’s. I’ve always wanted to see Irving in that play.”
 
But it was seven o’clock before she telephoned. She was to have been at home at half-past seven.
 
“That you, Sheelah? I’m not coming out to-night—not until morning. I&rsqu............