“They’s nothin’ like sin,” said he, with a sure smack of the lips, “t’ make good men. I knows it.”
“An’ Bessie?”
“Oh, Davy, lad, she’ll be safe with him!”
Then I, too, knew it—knew that sin had been beneficently decreed by God, whose wisdom seems so all-wise, once our perverse hearts are opened to perceive—knew that my dear sister would, indeed, be safe with this sinner, who sorrowed, also. And I was ashamed that I had ever doubted it.
“Look!” Skipper Tommy whispered.
Far off—across the harbour—near lost in the mist—I saw my sister and the doctor walking together.
My sister was waiting for me. “Davy,” she asked, anxiously, “where have you been?”
“On the hills,” I answered.
For a moment she was silent, fingering her apron; and then, looking fearlessly into my eyes—“I love him,” she said.