g along--not very fast, but in the right direction.

But that which did most for Jacob in his time of trouble was the
knowledge of Mr Fleming's forgiveness and friendship. It is not likely
that he had ever acknowledged, even to himself, that he had sinned
against him through his son more than others had done, but a sense of
the old man's silent anger had always been in him, and had been painful
and humiliating to him--how painful he knew by the sense of relief he
experienced whenever they came in contact afterward. He no longer
stepped aside when he saw him approaching, so that the neighbours should
not remark about the old man's steadily averted face. They had never
much to say to each other, but they met and exchanged kindly greetings
as other men did, and all Gershom saw the change that had come over them
both. Even his cousin Betsey grew friendly and frank in her intercourse
with him and his wife, and that was a change certainly.

Few people ever knew just what had brought about this changed state of
feeling. There was nothing to tell which Jacob cared to repeat. It
would have done no good to bring up the old, sad story again, he well
knew, and he said little about it even to his wife.

As for Mr Fleming--and indeed all the Flemings--the joyful tidings that
the letter brought on that fair September morning were too sacred and
sweet to be discussed much even among themselves. Katie always held
that her grandfather would have forgiven Jacob Holt all the same if the
letter had never come, because there was the Lord's command clear and
plain, "Forgive and ye shall be forgiven," and it must have come to that
at last.

"And, indeed, Davie, it was near at hand before the letter came. The
Lord had touched him. First there was the fear of losing you, and then
the fear of losing grannie, and then the letter came from the son he had
lost so long, and that was the last touch for which the rest had made
him ready. Oh! how good He has been to us! Surely, surely, Davie, we
can never through all our lives forget."

Mrs Fleming thought as Katie did, though they had never spoken together
of the subject. In her innermost heart she had believed--though even to
herself she had hardly put the thought into words--that on the subject
of Jacob Holt's past misdeeds her husband was hardly responsible for his
thoughts. The misery of his son's loss, not for this brief life only,
but forever and ever, as he could not but believe