?"

"I suppose so."

"But I don't know. I'm only a very ignorant old man; your friend, if
you'll have me."

"What do you think?"

"So far as I see, Jesse, the woman can arraign you on a charge of
bigamy. Moreover, if you seek divorce she can plead that there's equal
guilt, from which there's no release."

"And that's the law?"

"Man's law. But, Jesse, when you and Kate were joined in holy matrimony,
was it man's law which said, 'Whom God hath joined, let no man put
asunder.' What has man's law to do with the awful justice of Almighty
God?

"And here, my son, I am something more than a foolish old man." He rose
to his feet, making the sign of the cross. "I am ordained," he said, "a
barrister to plead at the bar of Heaven. Will you not have me as your
adviser, Jesse?"

"Whom God hath joined," Jesse laughed horribly, "that harlot and I."

"She swore to love, honor and obey?"

"Till death us part!"

"And that was perjury?"

"A joke! A joke!"

"That was not marriage, my son, but blasphemy, the sin beyond
forgiveness. The piteous lost creature has never been your wife. She
tried to break her way into our poor world of life and love. It is
forbidden and she was fearfully wounded. To-day she tried again, and is
there, in that forest, with the falling night."

"I told her what she is, straight from the shoulder."

"Who made her so?"

Jesse lowered his head.

"Who made her the living accusation of men's sins? She is the terrible
state's evidence, God's evidence, which waits to be released in the Day
of Judgment. You told her straight from the shoulder. Judge not that ye
be not judged. Remember that of all the men she knew on earth, you only
can plead not guilty."

"Because I married her?" asked Jesse humbly.

"Because you tried. You gave her your clean name, your pure life, your
manhood, an act of knightly chivalry. Arthur, Galahad, Perceval,
Launcelot, and many other gentlemen who are now at rest, will seek your
friendship in the after life. You are being tried as they were tried in
that fierce flame of temptation which tests the finest manhood.

"Only a cur would blame the weak. Only a coward would accuse the lost.
But in your manhood remember her courage, Jesse. Forgive as you hope for
pardon. Keep your life clean, from every touch of evil, but to the world
stand up for the honor of the name you gave her."

"I will."

"You forgive?"

"Yes."

"You will pray for her?"

"I will pray."

"And