. She was riding on her rounds upon a patient,
Southern tackey, and she was riding fast. But she reined up and
confronted him.

"Mr. Hope! There is a hateful rumor brought from New York about you. I
am going to tell you immediately. It is said--"

"Wait a minute!" he pleaded, holding out both hands. "Now. Go on."

"It is said that you are an escaped convict," continued the lady,
distinctly.

"It is false!" cried the nurse, in a ringing voice.

The doctor regarded him for a moment.

"I may be wrong. Perhaps it was not so bad. I was in a cruel hurry,
and so was Doctor Frank. Perhaps they said a discharged convict."

"What else?" asked Zerviah, lifting his eyes to hers.

"They said you were just out of a seven years' imprisonment for
manslaughter. They said you killed a man--for jealousy, I believe;
something about a woman."

"What else?" repeated the nurse, steadily.

"I told them I _did not believe one word of it_!" cried Marian Dare.

"Thank you, madam," said Zerviah Hope, after a scarcely perceptible
pause; "but it is true."

He drew one fierce breath.

"She was beautiful," he said. "I loved her; he ruined her; I stabbed
him!"

He had grown painfully pale. He wanted to go on speaking to this
woman, not to defend or excuse himself, not to say anything weak or
wrong, only to make her understand that he did not want to excuse
himself; in some way, just because she _was_ a woman, to make her feel
that he was man enough to bear the burden of his deed. He wanted to
cry out to her, "You are a woman! Oh, be gentle, and understand how
sorry a man can be for a deadly sin!" but his lips were parched. He
moved them dryly; he could not talk.

She was silent at first. She was a prudent woman; she thought before
she spoke.

"Poor fellow!" she said, suddenly. Her clear blue eyes overflowed. She
held out her hand, lifted his, wrung it, dropped it, and softly added,
"Well, never mind!" much as if he had been a child or a patient,--much
as he himself had said, "Never mind!" to Scip.

Then Zerviah Hope broke down.

"I haven't got a murderer's heart!" he cried. "It has been taken away
from me. I ain't so bad--_now_. I meant to be--I wanted to do--"

"Hush!" she said. "You have, and you shall. God is fair."

"Yes," said the penitent convict, in a dull voice, "God is fair, and
so he let 'em tell of me. I've got no fault to find with _Him_. So
nigh as I can understand Almighty God, He means well.... I guess
He'll pu