"These details are scarcely necessary, I should say. What are you here for?"
The old man's agitation was so great that he was compelled to pause before he answered; but strength seemed to come to him as he looked at the Reverend Emanuel Creamwell's stony face.
"The mother of these children is waiting in the churchyard to be buried."
"You received my message, I have no doubt."
"Some words were spoken to me as coming from you."
"Were not they sufficient?"
"I could not believe, sir, that the words which were delivered to me came from the lips of a minister of God."
A flash of something very like anger lighted up the small eyes of the Reverend Emanuel Creamwell.
"And so you come here to revile His minister?"
"I come here in all humility, sir," replied the old man.