House. He had treated them badly for several
weeks, and never gone near them; but they received him just as cordially
as ever, and took no notice of his absence, only expressed their pleasure
at seeing him, which touched him all the more; and then the thought
caused a lump in his throat that, perhaps, he might never see them again.
He did not like to speak of what he was about to do before Alice, because
it was an unpleasant subject for ladies' ears, but when she went out of
the room, he began at once to tell her brother all, from first to last.

Never had he seen Cosin so greatly disturbed. He listened with open
mouth and staring eyes to all that Tournier said without uttering a word.
Not a remark did he make: not a question did he ask. Then, when the tale
was told, and Tournier was waiting for some reply, Cosin started from his
chair, and began to pace up and down the room in extreme agitation. At
length he stopped in front of the other, and said, sternly but
sorrowfully,--

"Then, after all, you have given up God."

"I hope not."

"But you have, on your own shewing: and taken up with the devil."

Tournier writhed under this, and was about to say something sharp, but
Cosin went on,--

"I will prove it to you. God says, 'Vengeance is mine: I will repay';
and you say, 'Not so, I will avenge myself.' And whenever we contradict
God, we take up with the devil."

Then Cosin sat down again, and in his old gentle tone of voice, said,--

"Which do you think has sinned most against the other: Fontenoy against
you, or you against God?"

Tournier was silent. He was thinking of all the misery _that_ man had
brought upon him. How happy he might have been, if he had not come
between him and his love. He thought of his future, and how, even if
ever he were set at liberty again, life would be a blank to him. And he
ground his teeth with rage.

And then he heard his friend Cosin saying with quiet voice, like the
voice of conscience,--

"When once you had given up God, in years gone by, and you scouted Him
who had given you every comfort and blessing you possessed, who had
preserved you every day and night, so that you would have dropped down
dead had He withheld His hand any moment, and who had covered your head
in the day of battle--did He take vengeance on you? or did He open your
eyes and make you see some glimpse of His goodness?"

Then, after a pause, he went on in the same quiet way,--

"And when, in the