' I said.
'And she hasn't sent after him. You'd better save Bettina before they
kill her.'

'There's been enough lying about that dog,' said Mrs. Godfrey to me. 'If
he wasn't born in lies, he was baptized in 'em. D'you know why she
called him Harvey? It only occurred to me in those dreadful days when I
was ill, and one can't keep from thinking, and thinks everything. D'you
know your Boswell? What did Johnson say about Hervey--with an e?'

'Oh, _that's_ it, is it?' I cried incautiously. 'That was why I ought to
have verified my quotations. The spelling defeated me. Wait a moment,
and it will come back. Johnson said: "He was a vicious man,"' I began.

'"But very kind to me,"' Mrs. Godfrey prompted. Then, both together,
'"If you call a dog Hervey, I shall love him."'

'So you _were_ mixed up in it. At any rate, you had your suspicions from
the first? Tell me,' she said.

'Ella,' I said, 'I don't know anything rational or reasonable about any
of it. It was all--all woman-work, and it scared me horribly.'

'Why?' she asked.

That was six years ago. I have written this tale to let her
know--wherever she may be.

THE COMFORTERS

Until thy feet have trod the Road
Advise not wayside folk,
Nor till thy back has borne the Load
Break in upon the Broke.

Chase not with undesired largesse
Of sympathy the heart
Which, knowing her own bitterness,
Presumes to dwell apart.

Employ not that glad hand to raise
The God-forgotten head
To Heaven, and all the neighbours' gaze--
Cover thy mouth instead.

The quivering chin, the bitten lip,
The cold and sweating brow,
Later may yearn for fellowship--
Not now, you ass, not now!

Time, not thy ne'er so timely speech,
Life, not thy views thereon,
Shall furnish or deny to each
His consolation.

Or, if impelled to interfere,
Exhort, uplift, advise,
Lend not a base, betraying ear
To all the victim's cries.

Only the Lord can understand
When those first pangs begin,
How much is reflex action and
How much is really sin.

E'en from good words thyself refrain,
And tremblingly admit
There is no anodyne for pain
Except the shock of it.

So, when thine own dark hour shall fall,
Unchallenged canst thou say:
'I never worried _you_ at all,
For God's sake go