"Of course you did, my dear, but you had begun to deceive yourself long before you came to London, and that was when the mischief began. I think I have been to blame, too, perhaps, for I was proud of my truthful, upright girl, and may have let you hear me say more than was good for you to hear and you grew proud and self-righteous as a Pharisee."
"And now, now I am the worst girl living," sobbed Kate. "Oh, mother, I've thought of it all the while I was in prison. I, a Sunday scholar, in prison," she repeated with a shudder. "I have been a shame and disgrace to my class and teacher as well as you, mother, but I've sinned against God worst of all. Oh, mother, will He ever forgive me do you think?"
"Yes, Kate; He will forgive anything you have done or can do, for the sake of His dear Son, and if you are spared—as I hope and trust you may be—you must live a very different life in future. You thought you were strong enough and good enough before and did not need His grace. You never felt that you were a sinner needing the blood of Christ to cleanse and pardon you, but now——"
"Oh, mother, mother, my sins are too great," broke in Kate. "How could the Lord Jesus forgive such a wicked girl as I am?"
"Because He loved you—loved you so much as to die for you, Kate. My dear, you have thought so much of your own goodness that it is hard for you to believe now that God can forgive you without your deserving it; but was it as hard for you to believe that I would forgive you?"
Kate shook her head. "I knew you would forgive though I never could deserve it, because you always loved me so much," she said slowly.
"My dear, God loves you more than I do, with a wiser, purer, better love than even mine, and He wants you to believe it now, Kate, and hope in Him. I know you have been so weak and foolish that you cannot have any hope of yourself; but hope in God, my darling, confess all your sins to Him, tell Him the weakness and folly you have been guilty of, and ask His pardon for the past and strength and grace to live a new life in Christ for the future."
"I have prayed that He would pardon me, but oh, mother, how can I hope, how can I believe? He is so great, so holy."
"By taking Him at His word. If I told you anything, Kate, do you think it would be honouring me to say, 'You are so good, mother, I can't believe half you say?' Yet this is the way you are speaking of God; He says, 'Him that cometh unto Me I will in no wise cast out,' and 'Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners.' Mind, Kate, it was Jesus Christ, not the sinner's repentance, the tears he shed, the grief he felt, but Jesus Christ, who died 'the Just for the unjust.'"
After this talk with her mother Kate grew more calm and less unhappy. The prospect of going home, however, so different from what Kate had anticipated that return would be, was anything but pleasant now.