“For her sake I’ll go,” I answered; but I muttered between my teeth that it was for none of him I went.
I did not stop to saddle a horse, but went directly on foot. It was a mile or more to the cottage, and when I set out it was about twilight. Before I reached my destination, darkness had closed in. I heard the low sound of a single voice as I drew near the cottage, and when I came to the threshold the sight I saw within made me stop.
The moon was full and the bright light fell across the floor in a wide band. Meg’s face was in the shadow, but the lower half of the cot on which she lay was shrouded in the light. Mistress Miriam was kneeling at the foot of the bed, in the full glow of the light. She was praying, and her hands were clasped with her silver beaded rosary hanging across them. Since the first night of my arrival at the manor-house, I had not often come in contact with the religion I had so often cursed. Now a pang shot through my heart and I turned away. But at that moment long forgotten words came into my mind like a voice from the dead. “No, no, brother,” Ruth had said to me. “Vincent, turn the word of God into your own dull heart before you judge your neighbor.”
So Ruth, my sister, had said to me. I looked in again at this young woman praying in the moon-light and my heart softened. From her beautiful face I looked into the shadow where lay the woman with the memory of her sin.
I could not help but listen. Miriam’s voice was soft and pleading. It fell upon Meg’s ear like a promise of better things. She stopped moaning and her fingers, which were nervously twitching at the bedclothes, grew still and sank restfully by her side.
All this time I had been standing on the step outside, unknown to those within. I had been sent to watch the young mistress and to keep her from hearing what she should not. But I had no strength of will to interrupt this scene. I was about to turn away when my attention was attracted by some words of Miriam’s prayer.
“Holy Mother, help this poor woman. Make her happy in the life to come. In the name of Christ who died let not her death be upon our head. O God, what I have heard, let it not be true.”
My first thought was that the old woman had told her everything; but I was soon undeceived. An interruption came from the shadow.
“What have you heard, my lass?”
Miriam sprang up in excitement; as she did so her rosary fell from her hands to the floor near the door, where I was standing.