Mr. Hardy did not know it, to his shame he confessed. This sister of his in Christ had been a member of the same church, and he had not even known it. If she had happened to sit on the same side of the building where he sat, he would probably have wondered who that plain-looking person was, dressed so poorly. But she had always sat back on the other side, being one of a few poor women who had been attracted into the church and been comforted by Mr. Jones' simple piety and prayers.
The minister kneeled down and said a gentle word to the woman. Then as if in reply to a low-voiced request he began a prayer of remarkable beauty and comfort. Mr. Hardy wondered, as he listened, that he could ever have thought this man dull in the pulpit. He sat down and sobbed as the prayer went on, and took to himself the consolation of that heavenly petition. When Mr. Jones rose, Mr. Hardy still sat with his hands over his face. The surgeon was called out by someone. Then the minister, after making arrangements for the funeral of Scoville with the women who had come in, started to go out, when Mr. Hardy rose, and they went away together.
"Mr. Jones," said Mr. Hardy, as they walked along, "I have an explanation and a confession to make. I haven't time to make it now, but I want to say that I have met God face to face within the past twenty-four hours, and I am conscious for the first time in years of the intensely selfish life I have lived. I need your prayers and help. And I want to serve the church and do my duty there, as I never before have done it. I have not supported your work as I should. I want you to think of me this week as ready to help in anything in my power. Will you accept my apology for my contempt of your request a week ago? I will come into the meeting Thursday night and help in any way possible."
Mr. Jones' eyes filled with tears. He grasped Mr. Hardy's hand and said:
"Brother, God bless you! Let me be of service to you in any way I can."
Mr. Hardy felt a little better for the partial confession, and parted with his minister at the next corner, going down to his office.
It was now ten o'clock, and the day seemed to him cruelly brief for the work he had to do. He entered the office, and almost the first thing he saw on his desk was the following letter, addressed to him, but written in a disguised hand:
"Mr. Hardy,—Us in the casting room don't need no looking after but maybe the next pot of hot iron that explodes will be next the offis if you thinks we have bodies but no sols some morning you will wake up beleving another thing. We ain't so easy led as sum folks supposes. Better look to house and employ spesul patrol; if you do we will blak his face for him."
There was no signature to this threatening scrawl, which was purposely misspelled and ungrammatically composed. Mr. Hardy had received threats before, and paid little attention to them. He prided himself on his steady nerves, and his contempt of all such methods used to scare him. Only a coward, he reasoned, would ever write an anonymous letter of such a character. Still, this morning he felt disturbed. His peculiar circumstances made the whole situation take on a more vivid colouring. Besides all that, he could not escape the conviction that he was in a certain sense responsible for the accident in the casting room. It was not his particular business to inspect machinery. But his attention had been called to it, and he felt now as if he had been criminally careless in not making the inspection in the absence of the regular officer. An investigation of the accident would free Mr. Hardy from legal responsibility. But in the sight of God he felt that he was morally guilty. At this moment Mr. Burns came in. He looked sullen, and spoke in a low tone:
"Only half the men are back this morning, sir. Scoville's death and the injuries to the others have had a bad effect on the men."