tment against Cynthia,
quivering though she was with sympathy for the girl. For Mrs. Merrill,
though the canker remained, had already pardoned her husband and had
asked the forgiveness of God for that pardon. On other occasions, in
other crisis, she had waited and watched for him in the parlor window,
and to-night she was at the door before his key was in the lock, while
he was still stamping the snow from his boots. She drew him into the
room and told him what had happened.

"Oh, Stephen," she cried, "what are you going to say to her?"

What, indeed? His wife had sorrowed, but she had known the obstacles and
perils by which he had been beset. But what was he to say to Cynthia?
Her very name had grown upon him, middle-aged man of affairs though he
was, until the thought of it summoned up in his mind a figure of purity,
and of the strength which was from purity. He would not have believed
it possible that the country girl whom they had taken into their house
three months before should have wrought such an influence over them all.

Even in the first hour of her sorrow which she had spent that afternoon
in the parlor, Cynthia had thought of Mr. Merrill. He could tell her
whether those accusations were true or false, for he was a friend of
Jethro's. Her natural impulse--the primeval one of a creature which is
hurt--had been to hide herself; to fly to her own room, and perhaps
by nightfall the courage would come to her to ask him the terrible
questions. He was a friend of Jethro's. An illuminating flash revealed
to her the meaning of that friendship--if the accusations were true. It
was then she had thought of Miss Lucretia Penniman, and somehow she had
found the courage to face the sunlight and go to her. She would spare
Mr. Merrill.

But had she spared him? Sadly the family sat down to supper without her,
and after supper Mr. Merrill sent a message to his club that he could
not attend a committee meeting there that evening. He sat with his wife
in the little writing room, he pretending to read and she pretending to
sew, until the silence grew too oppressive, and they spoke of the matter
that was in their hearts. It was one of the bitterest evenings in
Mr. Merrill's life, and there is no need to linger on it. They talked
earnestly of Cynthia, and of her future. But they both knew why she did
not come down to them.

"So she is really going to Coniston," said Mr. Merrill.

"Yes," answered Mrs. Merrill, "and I think she