Effie could not suppress a cry.
CHAPTER XI.
"Then you have done something wrong," said Effie, loosening her hold of her brother's arm and backing to a little distance. He could scarcely see her face in the ever increasing darkness, but he noticed the change in her voice. There was an indignant note of pained and astonished youth in it. Effie had never come face to face with the graver sins of life; the word "prison" stunned her, she forgot pity for a moment in indignation.
"George," she said, with a sort of gasp, "father left mother to you,—in a sort of way he gave her up to you,—and you have done wrong; you have sinned."
"You talk just like a girl," said George; "you jump at conclusions. You, an innocent girl living in the shelter of home, know as little about the temptations which we young fellows have to meet out in the world, as you know of the heavens above you. My God! Effie, it is a hard world—it is hard, hard to keep straight in it. Yes, I have done wrong—I know it—and father gave mother to me. If you turn away from me, Effie, I shall go to the bad—I shall go to the worst of all; there will not be a chance for me if you turn from me."
The tone of despair in his voice changed Effie's frame of mind in a moment. She ran up to him and put her arms round his neck.
"I won't turn from you, poor George," she said. "It did shock me for a moment—it frightened me rather more than I can express; but perhaps I did not hear you aright, perhaps you did not say the word 'prison.' You don't mean to say that unless you get that impossible sum of money you will have to go to prison, George?"
"Before God, it is true," said George. "I cannot, I won't tell you why, but it is as true as I stand here."