"I must gif it to him," he said, reading her face.

"Hur knows," she said with a bitter sigh of disappointment. "But it is
hur right to keep it."

His right! The word struck him. Doctor May had used the same. He washed
himself, and went out to find this man Mitchell. His right! Why did this
chance word cling to him so obstinately? Do you hear the fierce devils
whisper in his ear, as he went slowly down the darkening street?

The evening came on, slow and calm. He seated himself at the end of
an alley leading into one of the larger streets. His brain was clear
to-night, keen, intent, mastering. It would not start back, cowardly,
from any hellish temptation, but meet it face to face. Therefore the
great temptation of his life came to him veiled by no sophistry, but
bold, defiant, owning its own vile name, trusting to one bold blow for
victory.

He did not deceive himself. Theft! That was it. At first the word
sickened him; then he grappled with it. Sitting there on a broken
cart-wheel, the fading day, the noisy groups, the church-bells' tolling
passed before him like a panorama, while the sharp struggle went on
within. This money! He took it out, and looked at it. If he gave it
back, what then? He was going to be cool about it.

People going by to church saw only a sickly mill-boy watching them
quietly at the alley's mouth. They did not know that he was mad, or they
would not have gone by so quietly: mad with hunger; stretching out his
hands to the world, that had given so much to them, for leave to live
the life God meant him to live. His soul within him was smothering to
death; he wanted so much, thought so much, and _knew_--nothing. There
was nothing of which he was certain, except the mill and things there.
Of God and heaven he had heard so little, that they were to him what
fairy-land is to a child: something real, but not here; very far off.
His brain, greedy, dwarfed, full of thwarted energy and unused powers,
questioned these men and women going by, coldly, bitterly, that night.
Was it not his right to live as they,--a pure life, a good, true-hearted
life, full of beauty and kind words? He only wanted to know how to use
the strength within him. His heart warmed, as he thought of it. He
suffered himself to think of it longer. If he took the money?

Then he saw himself as he might be, strong, helpful, kindly. The night
crept on, as this one image slowly evolved itself from the crowd of
other thoughts and st