"Well, they are true, so why shouldn't we say them?" asked one.
"She's been caught 'dead to rights,' so what's the use of mincing matters?" said another.
"But does it do any good to bring up all these things?" asked Faith. "If the poor girl 'comes honestly by them,' should we not be charitable even in speaking of her?"
"There is something in that," spoke up a woman that Faith did not know, "It's another case of the 'sins of the fathers being visited upon the children.' If there was nothing else in the world to keep me from believing in a God, that verse in the Bible would surely do it!"
"Well, I don't need that verse," said another voice, "for the misery and injustice on earth are enough to prove that no God of love or mercy could possibly have ordained it."
"But don't we make a great deal of the injustice and misery for ourselves?" asked Faith, very soberly; "for instance, hasn't Lou just made a lot of misery for herself? She knew she could not go on stealing forever without being punished."
"She probably couldn't help it," was the hesitating answer. "Perhaps she is a kleptomaniac—you know there are such people."
"Oh, but they are always rich people, who can afford to pay the judge for letting them off easy!" said one of the girls, laughing. "When a poor woman steals she's an out-and-out thief; but when a rich woman steals she's a kleptomaniac."
A laugh followed this explanation, but Faith could not join in it. Her thoughts were too full of the fate which had overtaken Lou, and which she knew was only a natural consequence.
Suddenly there was a scream from the direction of Mr. Denton's office, then another, and another, each more shrill and vibrating.