"That will do, Magda."
She was crumpled in a heap on the rug; and she allowed him to draw her to a sitting posture. With gasping efforts after self-control, she at length managed to stop.
"What is it all about?" he asked then. "Try to tell me—quietly."
"Rob—if—if she had died—"
"Yes. Go on."
"It would have been my doing."
"In what way? Hush—" as the storm threatened to return. "It would have been your doing—how?"
Gradually he induced her to pour out the whole—how she had failed all round, how she had lived for self only, how she had refused to help Merryl when asked, how that one ordinary slip in everyday kindness might have brought about tragic consequences. And when she had related her tale, she found that he knew it already at least in part, that he had divined what she must be going through, that he was here for the very purpose of bringing help.
Not help of his own. He was here to point her to ONE stronger than himself,—"mighty to save." Magda needed to be saved from her weakness of will, from her readiness to give in to temptation. For the past she needed forgiveness; for the future, power to fight and to conquer.
"But this must be no empty repentance," he urged. "You must let what has happened be a warning to you. It is in the small things of common life that we fail most grievously; it is in those small things that we often dishonour our Lord most, and do most harm to others. You have to make a fresh start now, to remember that you are bound to His service. It must not be any longer self-pleasing, self-indulgence—but—'Teach me to do the thing that pleaseth Thee!' When you get back into everyday life again, don't let yourself forget."