My duty required me to let the Prisoner know that her little daughter had arrived. Did that heart of iron melt at last? It might have been so, or it might not; the message sent back kept her secret. All that it said to me was: “Let the child wait till I send for her.”
The Minister had consented to help us. On his arrival at the prison, I received him privately in my study.
I had only to look at his face—pitiably pale and agitated—to see that he was a sensitive man, not always able to control his nerves on occasions which tried his moral courage. A kind, I might almost say a noble face, and a voice unaffectedly persuasive, at once prepossessed me in his favor. The few words of welcome that I spoke were intended to compose him. They failed to produce the impression on which I had counted.
“My experience,” he said, “has included many melancholy duties, and has tried my composure in terrible scenes; but I have never yet found myself in the presence of an unrepentant criminal, sentenced to death—and that criminal a woman and a mother. I own, sir, that I am shaken by the prospect before me.”
I suggested that he should wait a while, in the hope that time and quiet might help him. He thanked me, and refused.
“If I have any knowledge of myself,” he said, “terrors of anticipation lose their hold when I am face to face with a serious call on me. The longer I remain here, the less worthy I shall appear of the trust that has been placed in me—the trust which, please God, I mean to deserve.”
My own observation of human nature told me that this was wisely said. I led the way at once to the cell.
CHAPTER IV. THE MINISTER SAYS YES.
The Prisoner was seated on her bed, quietly talking with the woman appointed to watch her. When she rose to receive us, I saw the Minister start. The face that confronted him would, in my opinion, have taken any man by surprise, if he had first happened to see it within the walls of a prison.