"Weren't you afraid of such a big rascal?" he said.

"No, papa," answered the boy. "Ought I to have been?"

He put his hand to his forehead, as if trying to understand. His
father found he had himself something to think about.

There was a certain quiescence about Clare, ill to describe,
impossible to explain, but not the less manifest. Like an infant, he
never showed surprise at anything. Whatever came to him he received,
questioning nothing, marvelling at nothing, disputing nothing. What he
was told to do he went to do, never with even a momentary show of
disinclination, leaving book or game with readiness but no
eagerness. He would do deftly what was required of him, and return to
his place, with a countenance calm and sweet as the moon in highest
heaven. He seldom offered a caress except to little Mary; yet would
choose, before anything else, a place by his mother's knee. The moment
she, or his father in her absence, entered the room and sat down, he
would rise, take his stool, and set it as near as he thought he
might. When caressed he never turned away, or looked as if he would
rather be let alone; at the same time he received the caress so
quietly, and with so little response, that often, when his heavenly
look had drawn the heart of some mother, or spinster with motherly
heart, he left an ache in the spirit he would have gone to the world's
end to comfort. He never sought love--otherwise than by getting near
the loved. When anything was given him, he would look up and smile,
but he seldom showed much pleasure, or went beyond the regulation
thanks. But if at such a moment little Mary were by, he had a curious
way of catching her up and presenting her to the giver. Whether this