"Ten minutes since I saw it all." He lifted a dreadful eye. "It was BLAZED upon me in a flash of lightning." His voice had the hollow muffled sound of a man in a nightmare. "I saw myself: not the man the world is looking to, but plain Horatio Nelson—the sinner."
The confession, shuddering forth from the lips of the great seaman, sprang the horror in the other's heart.
"There, there!" he croaked. "There, there, Nelson!"
"Honours, Orders, Westminster Abbey, and the world's cheers are nothing," came the nightmare voice. "That remains."
The Parson collected himself and cleared his throat.
"We all make mistakes, Nelson," he said gruffly. "Everybody stumbles, but no man need lie in the mud."
"I must," cried the other hoarsely. "I must—in honour. Honour!" he cried, throwing back his head with terrible laughter. "Nelson's honour!—O, Joy, you knew me as I was: you see me as I am. You can judge. Is it not hideous that it should come to this?—that men should snigger when Nelson and honour are coupled together."
The tears rolled down the Parson's face.
"Ah, my dear fellow," he kept on saying, patting the other's back, "my dear, dear fellow."
"I have been hiding from my God all these years—and to-day He found me!" sobbed the voice upon his shoulder. "O, He is just—terribly just. He knows no mercy—none."