“How could you be better to me, or nearer to me then, than you are in this, or anything?” said her brother. “I feel that you did know him, Harriet, and that you shared my feelings towards him.”
She drew the hand which had been resting on his shoulder, round his neck, and answered, with some hesitation:
“No, not quite.”
“True, true!” he said; “you think I might have done him no harm if I had allowed myself to know him better?”
“Think! I know it.”
“Designedly, Heaven knows I would not,” he replied, shaking his head mournfully; “but his reputation was too precious to be perilled by such association. Whether you share that knowledge, or do not, my dear—”
“I do not,” she said quietly.
“It is still the truth, Harriet, and my mind is lighter when I think of him for that which made it so much heavier then.” He checked himself in his tone of melancholy, and smiled upon her as he said “Good-bye!”
“Good-bye, dear John! In the evening, at the old time and place, I shall meet you as usual on your way home. Good-bye.”
The cordial face she lifted up to his to kiss him, was his home, his life, his universe, and yet it was a portion of his punishment and grief; for in the cloud he saw upon it—though serene and calm as any radiant cloud at sunset—and in the constancy and devotion of her life, and in the sacrifice she had made of ease, enjoyment, and hope, he saw the bitter fruits of his old crime, for ever ripe and fresh.