"I do hope he ain't coming down with a fever or something," Mrs.

Black said aloud. Then she saw Mrs. Deacon Whittle, Lois Daggett, Mrs. Fulsom, and the wife of the postmaster approaching her house in the opposite direction. All appeared flushed and agitated, and Mrs.

Black hastened to open her door, as she saw them hurrying up her wet gravel path.

"Is the minister home?" demanded Lois Daggett breathlessly. "I want he should come right down here and tell you what he told me this noon. Abby Daggett seems to think I made it up out of whole cloth.

Don't deny it, Abby. You know very well you said.... I s'pose of course he's told you, Mrs. Black."

"Mr. Elliot has gone out," said Mrs. Black rather coldly.

"Where's he gone?" demanded Lois.

Mrs. Black was being devoured with curiosity; still she felt vaguely repelled.

"Ladies," she said, her air of reserve deepening. "I don't know what you are talking about, but Mr. Elliot didn't eat any dinner, and he is either sick or troubled in his mind."

"There! Now you c'n all see from that!" triumphed Lois Daggett.

Mrs. Deacon Whittle and Mrs. Judge Fulsom gazed incredulously at Mrs.

Solomon Black, then at one another.

Abby Daggett, the soft round of her beautiful, kind face flushed and tremulous, murmured: "Poor man--poor man!"

Mrs. Solomon Black with a masterly gesture headed the women toward her parlor, where a fire was burning in a splendidly nickeled stove full five feet high.

"Now," said she; "we'll talk this over, whatever it is."

Chapter XXII

A mile from town, where the angry wind could be seen at work tearing the purple rainclouds into rags and tatters, through which the hidden sun shot long rays of pale splendor, Wesley Elliot was walking rapidly, his head bent, his eyes fixed and absent.

He had just emerged from one of those crucial experiences of life, which, more than the turning of the earth upon its axis, serve to age a human being. For perhaps the first time in the brief span of his remembrance, he had scrutinized himself in the pitiless light of an intelligence higher than his own everyday consciousness; and the sight of that meaner self, striving to run to cover, had not been pleasant. Just why his late interview with Andrew Bolton should have precipitated this event, he could not possibly have explained to any one--and least of all to himself. He had begun, logically enough, with an illuminating review of the motives which led him into the ministry; they were a sorry lot, on the whole; but his subsequent ambitions appeared even worse. For the first time, he perceived his own consummate selfishness set over against the shining renunciations of his mother. Then, step by step, he followed his career in Brookville: his smug satisfaction in his own good looks; his shallow pride and vanity over the vapid insincerities he had perpetrated Sunday after Sunday in the shabby pulpit of the Brookville church; his Pharisaical relations with his people; his utter misunderstanding of their needs. All this proved poignant enough to force the big drops to his forehead.... There were other aspects of himself at which he scarcely dared look in his utter abas.e.m.e.nt of spirit; those dark hieroglyphics of the beast-self which appear on the whitest soul. He had supposed himself pure and saintly because, forsooth, he had concealed the arena of these primal pa.s.sions beneath the surface of this outward life, chaining them there like leashed tigers in the dark.... Two faces of women appeared to be looking on, while he strove to unravel the snarl of his self-knowledge. Lydia's unworldly face, wearing a faint nimbus of unimagined self-immolation, and f.a.n.n.y's--full of love and solicitude, the face which he had almost determined to forget.

He was going to Lydia. Every newly awakened instinct of his manhood bade him go.

She came to him at once, and without pretense of concealment began to speak of her father. She trembled a little as she asked:

"He told you who he was?"

Without waiting for his answer she gravely corrected herself.

"I should have said, who _we_ are."

She smiled a faint apology:

"I have always been called Lydia Orr; it was my mother's name. I was adopted into my uncle's family, after father--went to prison."

Her blue eyes met his pitying gaze without evasion.

"I am glad you know," she said. "I think I shall be glad--to have every one know. I meant to tell them all, at first. But when I found--"

"I know," he said in a low voice.

Then because as yet he had said nothing to comfort her, or himself; and because every word that came bubbling to the surface appeared ba.n.a.l and inadequate, he continued silent, gazing at her and marveling at her perfect serenity--her absolute poise.

"It will be a relief," she sighed, "When every one knows. He dislikes to be watched. I have been afraid--I could not bear to have him know how they hate him."

"Perhaps," he forced himself to say, "they will not hate him, when they know how you-- Lydia, you are wonderful!"

She looked up startled and put out her hand as if to prevent him from speaking further.

But the words came in a torrent now:

"How you must despise me! I despise myself. I am not worthy, Lydia; but if you can care--"

"Stop!" she said softly, as if she would lay the compelling finger of silence upon his lips. "I told you I was not like other women. Can't you see--?"

"You must marry me," he urged, in a veritable pa.s.sion of self-giving.

"I want to help you! You will let me, Lydia?"

She shook her head.

"You could not help me; I am better alone."

She looked at him, the glimmer of a smile dawning in her eyes.

"You do not love me," she said; "nor I you. You are my friend. You will remain my friend, I hope?"

She arose and held out her hand. He took it without a word. And so they stood for a moment; each knowing without need of speech what the other was thinking; the man sorry and ashamed because he could not deny the truth of her words; and she compa.s.sionately willing to draw the veil of a soothing silence over his hurts.

"I ought to tell you--" he began.

But she shook her head:

"No need to tell me anything."

"You mean," he said bitterly, "that you saw through my shallow pretenses all the while. I know now how you must have despised me."

"Is it nothing that you have asked me--a convict's daughter--to be your wife?" she asked. "Do you think I don't know that some men would have thanked heaven for their escape and never spoken to me again? I can't tell you how it has helped to hearten me for what must come. I shall not soon forget that you offered me your self--your career; it would have cost you that. I want you to know how much I--appreciate what you have done, in offering me the shelter of an honest name."

He would have uttered some unavailing words of protest, but she checked him.

"We shall both be glad of this, some day," she predicted gravely....

"There is one thing you can do for me," she added: "Tell them. It will be best for both of us, now."

It was already done, he said, explaining his motives in short, disjointed sentences.