The imagination had been sweet , as the thought of the rose is sweet before the bud is open ; but as the rose to the thought , so was love to the imagination of it . `` All my thoughts are poetry since baby came , '' my wife said once , rapturously . Our boy lived for twenty months . He was a sturdy , toddling rogue , so full of life and laughter and mischief that , when he died , one day , after the illness of an hour , it seemed a most absurd thing that he should be dead -- a thing I could have laughed at , until belief forced itself into my soul like a burning , searing iron . I think I grieved over my little son 's death as deeply and sincerely as ever man did , or could . But the heart of the father is not as the heart of the mother . Time brought no healing to Josephine ; she fretted and pined ; her cheeks lost their pretty oval , and her red mouth grew pale and drooping . I hoped that spring might work its miracle upon her . When the buds swelled , and the old earth grew green in the sun , and the gulls came back to the gray harbor , whose very grayness grew golden and mellow , I thought I should see her smile again . But , when the spring came , came the dream-child , and the fear that was to be my companion , at bed and board , from sunsetting to sunsetting . One night I awakened from sleep , realizing in the moment of awakening that I was alone . I listened to hear whether my wife were moving about the house . I heard nothing but the little splash of waves on the shore below and the low moan of the distant ocean . I rose and searched the house . She was not in it . I did not know where to seek her ; but , at a venture , I started along the shore . It was pale , fainting moonlight . The harbor looked like a phantom harbor , and the night was as still and cold and calm as the face of a dead man . At last I saw my wife coming to me along the shore . When I saw her , I knew what I had feared and how great my fear had been .
As she drew near , I saw that she had been crying ; her face was stained with tears , and her dark hair hung loose over her shoulders in little , glossy ringlets XXXXX a child 's .
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