Power turned on him his clear bright eye, and said nothing for a moment; but then he laid his arm across his shoulder in the old familiar manner, and said, “You are not happy now, Ken, as you used to be.”
“Why the devil not?”
Power shook his head. “Because your heart is nobler than your acts; your nature truer than your conduct; and that is and will be your punishment. Why do you nurse this bad feeling till it has so mastered you?”
Kenrick stood still, his cheeks flushed, his eyes downcast; and Power, as he turned away, sadly repeated, half to himself the wonderful verse—
“Virtutem videant, intabescantque relicta.”
Kenrick understood it; it came to his heart like an arrow, and rankled there; it made a wound, the faithful wound of a friend, better than the kisses of an enemy—but the time of healing was far-off yet.