"Thank God you came in time!" spoke Magdalen, with streaming eyes. "Thank God they did not die in that foul hole!"
"I do thank Him for that. I fear me poor Radley did not know that release for him had come; his greater release followed so hard afterwards. But Sumner lived long enough to know us, and to rejoice in the hope that Clarke's life would be spared. We did not tell him how little chance there was of that. 'He is one of God's saints upon earth,' were amongst his last words; 'surely He has a great work for him to do here. Afterwards he will walk with Him in white, for he is worthy.' And then in broken words he told us the story of those weeks in prison; and with a happy smile upon his lips he passed away. He did not desire aught else for himself. He left Clarke in the hands of his friends. He folded his hands together and whispered, 'Say the Nunc dimittis for me, and the last prayer;' and as we did so his soul took flight. The smile of holy triumph and joy was sealed by death upon his face."
"Faithful unto death," whispered Freda softly to herself, "he has won for himself a crown of life."
Anthony came to her presently, looking strangely white and shaken. They passed together out into the moonlight night. He was deeply moved, and she saw it; and her silence was the silence of sympathy.
"If only I had shared their faith, their steadfastness, their sufferings!" he spoke at last.
But she laid her hand upon his arm and whispered tenderly:
"Think not now of that. The past is not ours; and I know that God has forgiven all that was weak or sinful in it. No sin repented of but is washed away in the blood of the Lamb. Let us rejoice in that there are ever those who will follow the Lamb whithersoever He goeth, both here and hereafter, and will sing the song that no man else can learn. And if we ourselves fail of being counted in that glorious numbered host, may we not rejoice that others are found worthy of that unspeakable glory, and seek to gain strength and wisdom and grace from their example, so that in the days to come we may be able to tread more firmly in the narrow way they have travelled before us?"
They saw him the next day, for he asked to be moved out into the garden, into the sunshine of the sweet spring day. Weak as he was, Dr. Langton was of opinion that nothing could either greatly hurt or greatly restore him. And to fulfil his wishes was the task all were eager to perform. So, when the light was just beginning to grow mellow and rosy, and the shadows to lengthen upon the grass, Clarke was carried out and laid upon a couch in the shelter of the hoary walls, whilst he gazed about him with eyes that were full of an unspeakable peace and joy, and which greeted with smiling happiness each friendly face as it appeared.
They knew not how to speak to him; but they pressed his wasted hand, and sat in silence round him, trying to see with his eyes and hear with his ears, and listening to the fitful words which sprang from time to time to his lips.
"It is like the new heavens and the new earth," he said once--"the earth which the Lord will make new, free from the curse of sin. Ah, what a glorious day that will be! If this fallen world of ours can be so beautiful, so glorious, so full of His praise, so full of heavenly harmonies, what will that other earth he like, where He will reign with His saints, and sin and death shall be no more?"