I told her of how I had lost my mother, and my years of search for her, ending at that unmarked grave by the lake.

Virginia's eyes shone with tears and she softly pressed my hand.
I took from my little iron-bound trunk that letter which I had found in the old hollow apple-tree, and we read it over together by the flickering light of a small fire which I kindled for the purpose; and from the very bottom of the trunk, wrapped in a white handkerchief which I had bought for this use, I took that old worn-out shoe which I had found that dark day at Tempe--and I began telling Virginia how it was that it was so run over, and worn in such a peculiar way.
My mother had worked so hard for me that she had had a good deal of trouble with her feet--and such a flood of sorrow came over me that I broke down and cried.

I cried for my mother, and for joy at being able to think of her again, and for guilt, and with such a mingling of feeling that finally I started to rush off into the darkness--but Virginia clung to me and wiped away my tears and would not let me go.
She said she was afraid to be left alone, and wanted me with her--and that I was a good boy.

She didn't wonder that my mother wanted to work for me--it must have been almost the only comfort she had.
"If she had only lived," I said, "so I could have made a home for her!" "She knows all about that," said Virginia; "and when she sees you making a home for some one else, how happy it will make her!" Virginia was the older of the two, now, the utterer of words of comfort; and I was the child.

The moon rose late, but before we retired it flooded the grove with light.