been
oftentimes the case with her; but never so strong as now. A voice seemed
breathed into her soul--"Be not afraid."

She arose--her determination taken. "No," she thought, as standing at
the window she watched the sun rise gloriously--"No, Lord! _my_ Lord and
_my_ God!--I am not afraid."

Nevertheless, she suffered exceedingly. To bear the burden of this heavy
secret; to keep it from her mother; to disguise it before Mrs. Gwynne;
above all, to go to church, and have the ministry of such an one as
Harold between her and heaven--this last was the most awful point of
all; but she could not escape it without betraying him. And it seemed to
her that the sin--if sin it were--would be forgiven; nay, her voluntary
presence might even strike his conscience.

It was so. When Harold beheld her, his cheeks grew ashen pale. All
through the service his reading at times faltered and his eyes were
lowered. Once, too, during the epistle for the day, which chanced to be
the sixth Sunday after Epiphany, the plain words of St. John seemed to
attract his notice, and his voice took an accent of keen sorrow.

Yet, when Olive passed out of the church, she felt as though she had
spent there years of torture--such torture as no earthly power should
make her endure again. And it so chanced that she was not called upon to
do so.

Within a week from that time Mrs. Rothesay sank into a state of
great feebleness, not indicating positive danger, but still so nearly
resembling illness that Olive could not quit her, even for an hour. This
painful interest, engrossing all her thoughts, shut out from them even
Harold Gwynne. She saw little of him, though she heard that he came
almost daily to inquire at the door. But for a long time he rarely
crossed the threshold.

"Harold is like all men--he does not understand sickness," said that
most kind and constant friend, Mrs. Gwynne. "You must forgive him, both
of you. I tell him often it would be an example for him, or for any
clergyman in England, to see Olive here--the best and most pious
daughter that ever lived. He thinks so too; for once, when I hoped
that his own daughter might be like her, you should have heard the
earnestness of his 'Amen!'"

This circumstance touched Olive deeply, and strengthened her the more
in that work to which she had determined to devote herself. And a secret
hope told her that erring souls are oftentimes reclaimed less by a
Christian's preaching than by a Christian'