for the first time in her life, dressed in clothes
instead of rags for the first time in her life, Mercy's sister in
adversity crept fearfully over the beautiful carpet, and stopped
wonder-struck before the marbles of an inlaid table--a blot of mud on
the splendor of the room.

Mercy turned from Julian to meet the child. The woman's heart, hungering
in its horrible isolation for something that it might harmlessly love,
welcomed the rescued waif of the streets as a consolation sent from God.
She caught the stupefied little creature up in her arms. "Kiss me!" she
whispered, in the reckless agony of the moment. "Call me sister!" The
child stared, vacantly. Sister meant nothing to her mind but an older
girl who was strong enough to beat her.

She put the child down again, and turned for a last look at the man
whose happiness she had wrecked--in pity to _him_.

He had never moved. His head was down; his face was hidden. She went
back to hi m a few steps.

"The others have gone from me without one kind word. Can _you_ forgive
me?"

He held out his hand to her without looking up. Sorely as she had
wounded him, his generous nature understood her. True to her from the
first, _he_ was true to her still.

"God bless and comfort you," he said, in broken tones. "The earth holds
no nobler woman than you."

She knelt and kissed the kind hand that pressed hers for the last time.
"It doesn't end with this world," she whispered: "there is a better
world to come!" Then she rose, and went back to the child. Hand in hand
the two citizens of the Government of God--outcasts of the government of
Man--passed slowly down the length of the room. Then out into the hall.
Then out into the night. The heavy clang of the closing door tolled the
knell of their departure. They were gone.

But the orderly routine of the house--inexorable as death--pursued its
appointed course. As the clock struck the hour the dinner-bell rang. An
interval of a minute passed, and marked the limit of delay. The butler
appeared at the dining-room door.

"Dinner is served, sir."

Julian looked up. The empty room met his eyes. Something white lay on
the carpet close by him. It was her handkerchief--wet with her tears. He
took it up and pressed it to his lips. Was that to be the last of her?
Had she left him forever?

The native energy of the man, arming itself with all the might of his
love, kindled in him again. No! While life was in him, while time was
before