"My poor woman," said Kellson, his heart pierced by Rachel's agony, "what can I do? I have no power to alter the sentence. He had been convicted so often before that I felt bound to punish him severely."
"I know. I know he deserves it, but for the love of God, take off the lashes. Oh, Sir, you cannot flog him. Bad as he is, I love him best of all my children, and all the others are good."
"What can I do?" said Kellson, deeply distressed. "The sentence is passed. I have no power to change it."
"Oh, Sir, do you not understand—must I tell you? I thought you would have known."
"What do you mean?"
Rachel again burst into violent weeping, and swayed to and fro in her chair. For some time she could not speak, Kellson sat and looked at her, a vague feeling of uneasiness stirring in him. At length she became calmer, and sat still—her hands pressed to her face. She stood up, looked fixedly at Kellson for a moment, and then fell un her knees before him.
"Save him, save him from the flogging," she said hoarsely, "he is your son."
Kellson sprang to his feet and looked down at the kneeling woman; his eyes stony with horror, and his face white and rigid. He knew in a flash that what she said was true. The face that the prisoner's reminded him of, and that he could not localise, was his own. Several peculiarities in the prisoner's appearance now struck him. It was quite clear—as sure as death and as obvious as his sin. He had sentenced his own son.
For a. while there was no change in the position of either the man or the woman. Then the woman swayed forward, and laid her face on the man's feet.
"Save him, save him," she gasped.