“It is too late to pray now. My prayers would not be listened to.”
“You are mistaken,” said the vicar. “The prayers of a repentant sinner are always heard and answered.
“Ah, I do not know how to pray,” he muttered. “No one ever taught me that.”
“I will teach you,” said Patty Jamblin, and she knelt down upon the pointed stones and raised her hands towards the one ray of light which faint but beautiful fell like the eye of the Omnipotent upon her upturned face.
Slowly and sullenly the criminal fell upon his knees. The farmer also knelt, and the turnkey bared his head and lowered it, that he might listen to the prayer.
Soft and melodious as the murmurings of distant water, the farmer’s daughter’s voice rose from the depths of that dark cell, and pleaded with Heaven for the sinner’s soul.
The fountains of that hard and ignorant man’s heart were at length opened, and tears flowed from his eyes for the first time.
Patty ceased, then the venerable vicar, in a solemn and sonorous voice, gave utterance to an extemporaneous but beautiful prayer well adapted to the occasion, and after this Giles Chudley became an altered man.
Jamblin and Patty left, but Canon Lenthall remained with the prisoner for an hour or more after they had taken their departure.
It was thought strange by many who were acquainted with all the dramatis personæ connected with the tragedy in Larchgrove-lane, that Giles should never at any time have expressed a wish to see Ellen Fulford.