"Yes, but he was a beautiful child. What was his name, now?"

"It was Lockwin's name--let me see--David."

"Oh, yes, Davy, they called him."

"Well, she has erected the prettiest sarcophagus in the whole cemetery
for Davy. I tell you Esther Lockwin is a magnificent woman."

"She would have more critics, though, if she were not Wandrell's only
daughter."

"Wandrell's only daughter! You don't tell me so! Ah, yes, yes! That
accounts for it."

So, while the philosophers account for it, Esther Lockwin goes on with
the black business of life. Every week she waits impatiently for news
from Corkey. Every week he gives notice that he has found nothing.

"When spring comes, I'll find that yawl," he promises. He knows he can
do that much with time.

How often has Esther Lockwin thrown herself on a couch, weeping and
moaning as if her body would not hold her rebellious heart--as when
Corkey left her in those black and earliest days of the great tempest
of woe!

"It is marvelous that it is held to be dishonorable to die, and
honorable to live," she cries.