"A lotion!" gasped McFarquhar; "and would you be using the good whisky to wash your feet with?"
The minister smiled; but becoming immediately grave, he answered: "Mr. McFarquhar, how long have you been in the habit of taking whisky?"
"Fifty years," said McFarquhar promptly.
"And how many times have you given the bottle to your friend?"
"Indeed, I cannot say," said McFarquhar; "but it has never hurt him whatever."
"Wait a bit. Do you think that perhaps if Michael had never got the good whisky from his good friends he might not now be where he is?"
McFarquhar was silent. The minister rose to go.
"Mr. McFarquhar, the Lord has a word for you" (McFarquhar rose and stood as he always stood in church), "and it is this: 'We, then, that are strong, ought to bear the infirmities of the weak, and not to please ourselves.' It is not given to me to deliver Michael from the bondage of death, but to you it is given, and of you He will demand, 'Where is Abel, thy Brother?'"
The minister's last words rolled forth like words of doom.