Barbara's face had become very grave. "However wrong you are about my character," she said, "the reparation is not yet made. And you may be sure of this--that, whatever the criticism, I owe you friendship and you shall have it,"
The beggar trembled inwardly, but he shook his head. "You could hardly pull me up to a level," he said, "upon which friendship between us would be possible. Imagine that I have sunk to the chin in mud, and that at the last time of calling I have been pulled out. Still the mud clings to me."
"Nonsense," said Barbara, "you can be washed."
They both laughed, and at once became grave again.
"You don't know," he said, "what I've been or what I've done. You can't even imagine."
"That is not the point," said Barbara, "and this is: Are you sorry? If you really have been rotten, do you want to be sound and fine? If you do I'm your friend, and whatever help I can give you, you shall have."
"If you knew," he said humbly, "how I dread the bust being finished! I'll be like a child stealing a ride by the strength of his arms, I'll have to drop off then--won't I?--back into the mud."
"I'm not offering you friendship," she said, "merely while you are useful to me. Do well, Mr. Blizzard, and do good, and I will always be your friend."
"Do you believe that I want to do well, that I want to do good? That I want to wipe the past from the slate?"
"You have only to tell me," she said loyally, "and I shall believe."