e
in Rita. When I thought Rita was lost to me, I fear I permitted Sukey to
believe I would, you know, comply with her wishes; but now I can't, and
I don't know how to tell her about it. I said nothing, but my silence
almost committed me."

After a moment spent in thought, Billy answered: "Frederick the Great
used to say, 'In default of unanswerable arguments it is better to
express one's self laconically and not go beating about the bush.' Go
tell her."

"That's easier to advise than to do," retorted Dic. "She will cry,
and--"

"Yes, I know; if it were as easy to do as it is to advise, this would be
a busy world. She will cry, and a woman's tears hurt the right sort of
man. But bless my soul, Dic, why don't you settle your own affairs? I'm
tired of it all. It's getting to trouble me as much as it troubles you."
Billy paused, gazing into the fire, and dropped into a half-revery. "I
can see the poor little dimpler weeping and grieving. I can hear her
sobs and feel her heartaches. She is not good; but the fault is not
hers, and I wish I might bear her pain and suffer in her stead. I
believe it hurts me more to see others suffer than to suffer myself. I
wish I might bear every one's suffering and die on a modern Calvary.
What a glorious thought that is, Dic--the Master's vicarious atonement!
Even if the story be nothing but a fable, as some men claim, the thought
is a glorious one, and the fate--ah, the fate--but such a fate is only
for God. If I can't help the suffering of the world, I wish I might live
in the midst of Sahara, where I could not hear of human pain. It hurts
me, Dic. Indeed it does. And this poor little dimpler--I'm sorry, I'm
sorry."

"Ah, Billy Little, think of my sorrow," said Dic.

"It's a question whether we should shrink from our troubles or face
them," continued Little; "but in your case I should choose the
shrinking, and write to the poor, pathetic little dimpler. Poor thing!
Her days of dimpling are over. If you knew that you had led her astray,
your duty, I believe, would be clear; but there is the 'if' that gives
us serious pause and makes cowards of us both. Write to her, Dic. You
are too great a coward to face her, and I'm not brave enough even to
advise it."

Dic wrote to Sukey, and avoided the pain of facing her, but not the pain
of knowing that she suffered. His letter brought an answer from Sukey
that was harder to bear than reproaches.

Within two or three days Sukey wrote to Rita