e result of my rage was not so bad as it might have
been, though it has been bad enough.'

'Dick has forgiven that,' repeated Estelle, earnestly. 'He has indeed,
and no one but you, and he, and I know anything about it.'

'Are you sure, Missie? It seems too wonderful to believe! If I thought
so--why, I would go and see him when I take you home. It would please
him, you say; and--and--well, I would like to ask---- '

'For what, Jack?'

'I would like to hear him say himself that he forgives---- '

He hid his face in his hands and groaned. Ruined for life, but _not
dead_. Frightfully, hopelessly injured, but generous, forgiving! He
could understand that Dick--the young handsome Dick of his
recollection--had prayed for his destroyer, and--thank God--had not
prayed in vain. It was, indeed, a deeply repentant, broken-hearted man
who sat there in the spring sunshine with bowed head, and bitter sorrow
for a deed which could not be undone.

As Estelle looked at Jack's figure, and saw the shudder which now and
again passed over him, her pity was perhaps greater for this sufferer
than it was for poor Dick. Her eyes were blinded with tears.

'Jack,' she said, when she could command her voice, 'dear kind Jack, you
never refuse me anything. Don't say "no" to what I am going to ask you
now.'

A murmur was the only reply.

'What I want you to do will not make you more miserable, Jack, and it
will be a great kindness to poor Dick. Give him the pleasure of knowing
what a good fellow you are now, and how miserable and sorry you are. He
_does_ forgive, you know, and he is so anxious about you, though he
cannot speak properly, and tell you as he would if he were well.'

'You are sure he would wish it?'

'I am certain.'

'Missie,' he said, raising his despairing face, 'look at the position I
am in. You are but a child, but your kind heart can understand as few
older persons seem to do. If I go to see Dick Peet, I am proclaiming my
sin to the world; and who is the sufferer?--my mother! I deserve no
mercy, and for my own sake I would not spare myself one grain of shame
or misery, for it was a black deed, brutally done in a frenzy of envy.
But Mother--ah! Missie, you don't know what a mother she has been to me.
She has sacrificed her whole life, and does not _think_ it a sacrifice!'

'But if Dick can and does forgive, Jack,' said Estelle, 'would not Goody
be glad that you have it from his own lips? Would she not feel you were
be