He took the chair she offered, and with a question or two sought to lead her on to talk of the subject about which he had come to see her.
“The very title of the subject,” Hammond explained, “is perfectly foreign to me.”
“It was all so, so foreign to me,” she returned. Then, as swift tears flooded her eyes, she turned to him with a little rapturous cry, saying,—
“And it would all have been foreign to me for ever, but for you, Mr. Hammond. I never, never can forget that but for you my soul would have been in a suicide’s hell, where hope and mercy could never have reached me. As long as I shall live I shall never forget the awful rush of soul-accusation that swept over me, when my body touched the foul waters of that muddy river that night. The chill and shock of the waters I did not feel, but the chill of eternal condemnation for my madness and sin I did feel.
“I saw all my life as in a flash. All the gracious warnings and pleadings that ever, in my hearing, fell from my sainted father’s lips, as he besought men and women to be reconciled to God, seemed to swoop down upon me, condemning me for my unbelief and sin. Then—then you came to my rescue—and——”
Her tears were dropping thick and fast now.
“And—my soul—had respite given in which to—to—seek God—because—you saved my body.”
Overcome with her emotion, she turned her head to wipe away the grateful tears. When next she faced him, her voice was low and tender, her eyes glowed with a light that Tom Hammond had never seen in a human face before.
“Now, if my Lord come,” she said softly, rapturously, “whether at morning, at noontide, at midnight, or cock-crowing, I shall be ready to meet Him in the air.
“I used to think that if ever I was converted, I should meet my dear father and mother at the last day, at the great final end of all things.