profit in turn by what little wisdom I have to soften her lot to whom I
do owe all?"

Margaret assented warmly, and a happy thing it was for the little
district assigned to her; it was as if an angel had descended on them.
Her fingers were never tired of knitting or cutting for them, her
heart of sympathizing with them. And that heart expanded and waved its
drooping wings; and the glow of good and gentle deed began to spread
over it; and she was rewarded in another way by being brought into more
contact with Gerard, and also with his spirit. All this time malicious
tongues had not been idle. "If there is nought between them more than
meets the eye, why doth she not marry?" etc. And I am sorry to say our
old friend Joan Ketel was one of these coarse sceptics. And now one
winter evening she got on a hot scent. She saw Margaret and Gerard
talking earnestly together on the Boulevard. She whipped behind a tree.
"Now I'll hear something," said she; and so she did. It was winter;
there had been one of those tremendous floods followed by a sharp
frost, and Gerard in despair as to where he should lodge forty or fifty
houseless folk out of the piercing cold. And now it was, "Oh, dear, dear
Margaret, what shall I do? The manse is full of them, and a sharp frost
coming on this night."

Margaret reflected, and Joan listened.

"You must lodge them in the church," said Margaret quietly.

"In the church? Profanation."

"No; charity profanes nothing, not even a church; soils nought, not even
a church. To-day is but Tuesday. Go save their lives, for a bitter night
is coming. Take thy stove into the church, and there house them. We will
dispose of them here and there ere the lord's day."

"And I could not think of that; bless thee, sweet Margaret, thy mind is
stronger than mine, and readier."

"Nay, nay, a woman looks but a little way, therefore she sees clear.
I'll come over myself to-morrow."

And on this they parted with mutual blessings.

Joan glided home remorseful.

And after that she used to check all surmises to their discredit.
"Beware," she would say, "lest some angel should blister thy tongue.
Gerard and Margaret paramours? I tell ye they are two saints which meet
in secret to plot charity to the poor."

In the summer of 1481 Gerard determined to provide against similar
disasters recurring to his poor. Accordingly he made a great hole in his
income, and bled his friends (zealous parsons always do that) to build a