With a start she awoke. A start often wakes us from the soundest sleep, as if some spirit spoke. Deborah Fleming was so wide awake in a moment that she saw through her open window the little pale ghost of the waning moon, the drifting clouds flitting by. A strange feeling was on Deborah. Had she been dreaming that she had seen a light shining under her father's door? Dream or vision, she seemed to see it still, and was irresistibly drawn thither by a mysterious inner sense of alarm. She must go to her father's room, to see that all was well. With a wildly beating heart, she threw on her dressing-gown and went swiftly out. Gray dawn filled all the passages, a gray cold dawn, and the little birds were beginning to twitter. But yes—oh, strange and true, a light was glimmering under her father's door!
Deborah heard him moving; she knocked. 'Father!'—No answer.—'Father!'
'Who is there?'
'Deborah! Father, open your door; I must speak with you at once.'
She tried the door: it gave way; and Deborah saw a room scattered over with papers, in the wildest confusion. The window stood open, and Sir Vincent, looking gray and haggard in the uncertain light, stood against the table in the middle of the room. He was dressed; his long white hair was ruffled; his face was gray, pale; his eyes gleamed strangely on Deborah from under their lowering brows.
'Father!' said Deborah, 'my father!' A great trembling was on her, he looked at her so strangely; but she kept outwardly calm. She laid her hands upon his arm, and then her eyes fell from his troubled face to his trembling hand, which was striving vainly to hide something amongst the papers on the table. Deborah saw the handle of a pistol; she drew it out, and regarded him steadfastly. 'Father, father! what is this?'
He turned from her; his white head was bowed with shame in his hands, and she heard a bitter sob.
'I know it now,' said Deborah, with terrible calmness. 'God called me here. O dear father, what have you thought on? To get free of ruin, you would kill your soul. Kind heaven have mercy on thee! You would leave me, father; you would leave me and Charlie.' She flung the pistol out of the room; she threw her arms round him. Sobs were shaking the strong man's frame.
'O never think to leave me alone, father dear. It was sinful of you not to call me; you might have known your little daughter would sooner share your death, than wake to find you dead.'
'God forgive me, Deb; God forgive me;' and he sank into his chair faint, trembling, shuddering. Deborah, on her knees beside him, scarcely knew her proud father, he was so unmanned. She waited in silence, with her head laid down on his knee. When he could speak, he said: 'I see God's hand in this; I believe in Him as I never believed before. Child! nothing less than a miracle brought thee here, as heaven is my witness; in another moment, Deb, I should have been a dead man. I had the pistol in my hand; may He forgive me, Deb!'