And then there was a pause. It seemed to Hester that her own brokenheartedness was a sort of child's passion in comparison. She said humbly—
"Will you tell me what you are afraid of? There is nobody blamed but one. There is not a name spoken of but one. I don't know if that is any comfort to you, Captain Morgan."
"And the one is her boy, the apple of her eye, the only one that she has trusted, her choice out of all the world," the old lady said. "Oh be silent, be silent, my old man! What is your pride to that? I would rather I had a share of the burden—I would like to be suffering with her." The tears stood in the deep wells of those old eyes, which had wept so much. She was past weeping now. "The Lord forgive him and bring him back," she said.
"You mean punish him, you mean give him over to the powers of darkness that he belongs to! What does he deserve, a man that has used a woman like that?"
"I am not asking what he deserves. I will tell you what he would get if he would come back. Pardon!" said the old woman with a sob, instinctively putting out her old soft hands.
"I am not for pardon," said the captain vehemently, his head moving in his agitation, his hands shaking. "I am for every soul bearing its own burden. Here is a woman that has spread prosperity around her. She has been kind, even when she has not been merciful. The grateful and the ungrateful, she has been good to them all. She has been like the sun shining and the rain raining upon both just and unjust. And here is the end of her, stung to her heart by the child of her bosom. For it will be the end of her. She is a grand woman. She won't bear being deceived."
"Do not say that," said Hester; "she is so strong, stronger than any of us—if you had seen her last night!"
"Where could I have seen her last night?" he said quickly; then, with a smile, "that is all you know, you children. Yes, stronger than any one of you, able to do everything. Do you remember the French boy in Browning's ballad, Hester, that could not bear it when his Emperor asked if he were wounded? 'I'm killed, sire!' That is like Catherine. She stands like a tower. I can see her in my mind's eye. She needs no sleep, no rest: but she is killed for all that."
Hester rose to her feet as he spoke in an excitement she could not control.
"I must go," she said. "I must go—I might be wanted."