"It was a rude way to behave when I trusted you so far as to leave you here alone," he said. "But as your sorrow seems so real, I will pardon you. I know, too, that you do not ask this of me from a dread that I will punish you for what has been done, but from a sense of duty, and a feeling of regret at having done wrong."
"You are very kind," said James, "and I thank you for it; but oh, sir, will you ever trust me again as you once did? For, indeed, I will try hard to deserve it always."
Mr. Wise paused, and looked in his face for a moment, and then said,—
"Yes; I feel that I can trust you still; for I think that you will be more on your guard for the future. And, at any rate," he said, taking the hand of James in his own, "I can rely firmly upon your word; for you have always told me the truth—the whole truth; and when you do wrong, you never try to excuse it, or make it seem right."
James tried to thank Mr. Wise for the kind words he had spoken, but he could not; his heart was too full for words, and he could only press the hand which held his own, in token of what he felt. As he did this, he turned away from the desk.
He had hardly taken his seat, when Edward West rose and went up to Mr. Wise, and after him, one by one, came each of the four boys who had gone back into the school-house on the day before without leave. Not one stayed behind—not even the one who had been so angry lest James Black should tell of them. As head of the party, Edward spoke for them, telling Mr. Wise that they were to blame for the ruin of his papers, as James would not have been likely to leave his work if they had not come back to school to tempt him. He said that they knew that they had done wrong in not going home as they were told, and that if the master chose to punish them, they felt that it was but right, but that they hoped to behave better in time to come.
Mr. Wise was pleased with the frank manner of the boys, in so freely telling him of their bad conduct; yet their doing so was a matter of some wonder to him. Perhaps Edward saw this, for he said,—
"At first we urged James to hide his fault from you, sir; but when he told us, in such a firm way, that he would not tell a lie, we were shamed out of our own desire to conceal the truth."
"You did right, in part," said Mr. Wise; "but I hope you will learn to tell the truth from a pure love of truth, and to shun a lie from a deep hatred of all that is false. Study your Bibles, and you will find how God hates lying; and you will also learn there the awful fate of liars."
Then, after a few words of reproof and caution, he sent them to their seats.