"That child's mother is not dead. Where she is now I know not—perhaps in a foreign country hiding her guilt and her shame. All say that a lovelier child was never seen than that wretch—God bless her—how beautiful is the poor creature now in her happiness singing over her flowers! Just such another must her mother have been at her age. She is now an outcast—and an adulteress."
The Pastor turned away his face, for in the silence he heard groans, and the hollow voice again spoke.—
"Through many dismal days and nights have I striven to forgive her, but never for many hours together have I been enabled to repent my curse. For on my knees I implored God to curse her—her head—her eyes—her breast—her body—mind, heart, and soul—and that she might go down a loathsome leper to the grave."
"Remember what He said to the woman—'Go, and sin no more!'"
"The words have haunted me all up and down the hills—His words and mine; but mine have always sounded liker justice at last—for my nature was created human—and human are all the passions that pronounced that holy or unholy curse!"
"Yet you would not curse her now—were she lying here at your feet—or if you were standing by her deathbed?"
"Lying here at my feet! Even here—on this very spot—not blasted, but green through all the year—within the shelter of these two rocks—she did lie at my feet in her beauty—and as I thought her innocence—my own happy bride! Hither I brought her to be blest—and blest I was even up to the measure of my misery. This world is hell to me now—but then it was heaven!"
"These awful names are of the mysteries beyond the grave."
"Hear me and judge. She was an orphan; all her father's and mother's relations were dead, but a few who were very poor. I married her, and secured her life against this heartless and wicked world. That child was born—and while it grew like a flower—she left it—and its father—me who loved her beyond light and life, and would have given up both for her sake."
"And have not yet found heart to forgive her—miserable as she needs must be—seeing she has been a great sinner!"