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Show 21-6 Mother turned to look at me. "Have you ever seen any visitors there, Annie?" Her voice rose as it did when she became angry. I shook my head. "So, you see, I just had to come and tell you. How much we care for Andrew. And just want what is best for him." "I've seen Andrew," Mrs. Crayton spoke at last. "I went after he first came home. And twice after that." She began to rock again. Mother nodded. "But, you tell me, what is the point? We have our lives to live, a farm to run," she waved her arm around the room, "and can Andrew help at that? He's ruined. The doctor told us he could never do any heavy work, that his lungs were burned along with the rest of him. I don't know if that was your husband, but you ask him that, Mrs." Mother sat back, still holding tight to my hand. "I'm not so sure all these boys should have been saved, to tell the God's truth. Do you know what it's like to look at the boy you sent away whole and see his face is all gone?" Mrs. Crayton stood up suddenly and walked to a table standing in the corner. She opened a drawer and took out a picture. "Here is Andrew, before he went away." I reached out to take the picture. It was not a good one, fuzzy and taken from a distance. Andrew was squinting into the sun, his hands behind his back, his hair tousled. But his face. He was smiling and it looked like his nose was covered with freckles. Nothing in that picture looked like the Andrew I knew. I handed the picture to Mother. She glanced at it. "They took that boy and sent back a stranger. I know I should go see him, but it only hurts us both." Mrs. Crayton stood in front of us. |