"She says, 'Brother Harvey, when I do anything wrong, you take me on your knee and talk to me and that makes me feel so bad that I never do that kind of wrong again. Why don't you take those bad men on your knee and talk to them, so they won't do so again?' I showed her that such an arrangement was hardly practicable, and then she fired her solid shot that pierced my ship between wind and water: 'Brother Harvey, maybe it's you that has done wrong; why don't you sit down on their knees and let them give you a talking to? Then you won't be bad any more."
Hugh and Harvey broke into laughter, during which Dollie, who had become tired of sitting still full two minutes, slid off O'Hara's knee and ran out of the room.
"We smile at the odd conceits of the little ones," continued Harvey, "but you know that the truest wisdom has come from the mouths of babes. I hushed her, but what she said set me thinking—'Why don't you let them give you a good talking to?' That was the very thing you had asked and I had refused. I set out to take a long walk, and was absent most of the day. Her question kept coming up to me, and I tried to drive it away. The effort made me angry and ended in a decision to be sterner than ever. I would not yield a point; I would import a body of men at large expense and keep them at work, just because I was too proud to undo what I knew was wrong.
"Still my conscience troubled me, but for all that I don't think I would have yielded. Pride, the greatest of all stumbling-blocks, was in my way. Reaching home, I learned that Dollie was lost; then, of course, every other thought went from my head. Nothing else could be done until she was found."
Harvey was about to tell his guest his suspicion that he had had a hand in the abduction of the child, but he was ashamed, and really there was no call for such a confession.
"Well, it was you who found her. I repeat that my debt to you can never be paid. And yet I do not believe that that obligation would have led me to yield, where I felt that a principle was at stake. It was the words of Dollie, spoken yesterday, that stuck to me. They kept me awake most of the night and played a part in the dreams that I had about her being lost in the woods and eaten up by panthers and all sorts of creatures. When I awoke this morning, the mists had cleared away. I saw my error, and fully made up my mind to do all I could to correct it. I went to the telegraph office before breakfast and sent a message to Vining countermanding the order for the men. Then I came back and had just finished my meal when a message was brought to my house. Odd, wasn't it?"
"I see nothing odd in a telegram for you."
"I mean in the telegram itself."
"I could not answer that unless I saw it."
"Of course," said Harvey with a laugh, wheeling about in his chair and picking up one of the yellow slips of paper which the Western Union furnishes its patrons gratis.