“Now, Jack,” said Annie, leaning tenderly on his shoulder and looking into his face by the pale starlight, while her touch and the tones of her voice set a little stream of joy dancing and singing in his heart, like the shadowy brook at their feet, “I’m going to be frank with you; hear what I say. Don’t run away. Don’t hide. Don’t try to shirk the consequences of what you have done, but go home with me now.”
“To Mr. Chatford’s?” said Jack with a start.
“Yes, just as if nothing had happened. Aunt’s folks will receive you kindly, I know, from what they have said.”
“Never!” said Jack. “I never can enter that house again as long as there’s a lie between me and Phin. It may be natural for his father to believe him instead of me; but it’s something I never can get over. No!” he added, as she would have urged him; “I can go anywhere else, and suffer anything, before I can go back there. Besides, how long before Sellick would be after me again, and carry me off to jail?”
“Worse things than that might happen to you,” Annie replied.
“What?” said Jack.
“To go back to your former life and associates, to fall again under bad influences, and lose all the good you have gained since you have been with Uncle Chatford’s folks; that would be worse. I don’t want you to go to jail, but I’d rather see you go there innocent, than run away as if you were guilty. How proud I should be of you, if you could stand up and say, ‘I may have done wrong, but I didn’t mean to; now here I am, put me in jail if you want to!’ You would be proud of yourself too! Your face would shine as it never did before.”
“O Miss Felton!” said Jack, “that’s just the way Percy Lanman talked!”
“Get rid of all rash thoughts of revenge and wild living, and put your trust in Providence, and in your own integrity,” she went on. “Be yourself, your better self, always, and you’ll come off victorious over everything. That’s my advice, dear Jack; and if Percy Lanman gave you the same, I honor him for it. Now will you come in with me?”
“I’ll go as far as the door with you,” said Jack, “but I can’t go in; I can’t!”