“I have been haunting your house all the afternoon. I thought I should have to go without seeing you. You have heard—of course.”
“Everything, I believe.”
“I know how Stephen feels. His life has been so perfect! His temper is angelic! And yet Rose—I did mean to do better. I resolved—”
“In your own strength;” I said softly. “God let you see how weak that was. And yet you must not be cast down. Even Christians have to try many times. But there is the promise. And God saves to the uttermost, to the fartherest weakness, the blackest sin.”
“I was so angry. I just understood how they had been cheating me all along, and what a fool I had been. They added taunts and insults. I struck out blindly and madly, not caring. Was it God who saved me from the commission of an awful crime? I fled thinking myself a murderer. I hid in lanes and byways for three miserable days, knowing how Cain felt when he said his punishment was greater than he could bear. If Kelsey had died I think I should have thrown myself into the river. Then I saw in a paper that he had been only temporarily injured. The affair was headed—‘A gambling brawl,’ and even though I felt relieved, the disgrace stung me so keenly.”
“But it has been forgotten by this time. And Stephen means that you shall stay with him for some months at least. You can redeem all the past. Oh, try.” I pleaded earnestly.
“Tell me about Stephen?” he said tremulously.
I went briefly over the incidents of his return, but I did lay great stress upon Stephen’s anxiety, his willingness to forgive the past, for I knew he would be less severe now than a month ago. I pictured the home, and the pleasure there might be for both in it.
“And your sister is there,” he replied in an odd tone of voice that was more comment than inquiry.
“Yes.” Did he guess? “Oh,” I said, “it may be—perhaps it is wrong for me to hint it—but he likes her very much.”