The Alchemist's Secret

by Isabel Cecilia Williams

"You know all then? He told you?"

"He told me in the delirium of fever. He never knew he told; he died thinking he carried the secret with him to the grave. He was faithful even unto death."

"Faithful even unto death. And you, his brother, come to me now and, knowing all, dare to hold out to me the hope of forgiveness and of peace?" and the man stared incredulously into the kind, pitying eyes bent upon him.

"I, his brother, offer you now forgiveness of all your sins and peace which surpasseth all understanding."

The sick man was seized with a violent fit of coughing and when it had passed, he lay back in his chair exhausted, with closed eyes and white, pain-drawn face. The priest, wishing to give him a moment to rest and recover his breath, walked to the window and looked out. In the field below more than a score of ragged men, women and children were scratching and digging among piles of ashes, eagerly searching for and gathering up the half-burned cinders; searching, too, in the forlorn hope of finding something of greater value that might have been thrown away by accident. The rain beat noisily on the window pane and the priest shivered as he looked at those scantily-clad little children, not one of whom could boast of shoes and stockings, and at the white heads and bent figures of old women on whose unprotected shoulders the rain fell so pitilessly. What mattered the inclemency of the weather to them? Winter would be here by and by; they must gather in all the fuel possible before it was upon them with its snow and sleet and icy blasts. In fact, even when winter came, many of these same little children and old women, even grown men who either could not find other work to do or did not care to seek it, many of these same people would be seen day after day scratching and digging in this same field of ashes.

The priest turned from the window with a sigh of pity for the miserable creatures below. His glance strayed over the untidy kitchen which bore all the marks of the most extreme poverty and he gave another sigh of pity for the man who had been brought so low in the last days of his life, the man whom he had known in the time of his success and prosperity.

He approached the chair beside the stove and the tired eyes opened slowly and looked at him. Unaccustomed tears filled those eyes and the hard voice softened marvelously.

"Nancy was right," that changed voice was saying. "I am dying. Father, you say you bring me forgiveness in his name, forgiveness for the great wrong I did him. In his name, I will accept the gift. Father, I will confess my sins to you and beg God's pardon for them."

Two hours later, when poor, tired Maggie, with aching arms and aching back, returned from her day's work, she was surprised at the gentleness with which he greeted her. Never had he been so kind before: she was more accustomed to harsh words and even curses than kindness from him. She set about preparing their evening meal and he actually ate what she put before him without even once finding fault with the food or with her. She could not understand it and felt vaguely alarmed.

Again the door opened and a face peered in anxiously. It would look as if the owner of the face was fully prepared to slam the door and take to her heels at a second's notice. The man in the chair by the stove smiled faintly and called: