The doctor was a patient man as well as a wise one—he left the room without a word. But, thinking to pour oil on Pete's wounds, and not minding that his oil was vitriol, Cæsar said—
“If it's the Lord's will, it's His will, sir. The sins of the fathers are visited upon the children—yes, and the mothers, too, God forgive them.”
At that Pete leapt to his feet in a flame of wrath.
“You lie! you lie!” he cried. “God doesn't punish the innocent for the guilty. If He does, He's not a good God but a bad one. Why should this child be made to suffer and die for the sin of its mother? Aye, or its father either? Show me the man that would make it do the like, and I'll smash his head against the wall. Blaspheming, am I? No, but it's you that's blaspheming. God is good, God is just, God is in heaven, and you are making Him out no God at all, but worse than the blackest devil that's in hell.”
Cæsar went off in horror of Pete's profanities. “If the Lord keep not the city,” he said, “the watchman waketh in vain.”
Pete's loud voice had aroused the child. It made a little cry, and he was all softness in an instant. The women moistened its lips with barley-water, and hushed its fretful whimper.
“Come,” said Philip, taking Pete's arm.
“Let me lean on you, Philip,” said Pete, and the stalwart fellow went tottering down the stairs.
They sat on opposite sides of the fireplace, and kept the staircase door open that they might hear all that happened in the room above.
“Get thee to bed, Nancy,” said the voice of Grannie. “Dear knows how soon you'll be wanted.”