shall be," said Philip, confidently. "And I don't want
you to be afraid. They will not dare to harm you."

"No, Philip!" exclaimed his wife, eagerly; "you must not be mistaken. I
did not faint away to-night because I was afraid for myself. Surely I
have no fear there. It was the thought of the peril in which you
stand daily as you go out among these men, and as you go back and forth
to your meetings in the dark. I am growing nervous and anxious ever
since the shooting; and when I was startled by the man here to-night I
was so weak that I fainted. But I am sure that they do not care to harm
me; you are the object of their hatred. If they strike any one it will
be you. That is the reason I want you to leave this place. Say you will,
Philip. Surely there are other churches where you could preach as you
want to, and still not be in such constant danger."

It required all of Philip's wisdom and love and consciousness of his
immediate duty to answer his wife's appeal and say no to it. It was one
of the severest struggles he ever had. There was to be taken into the
account not only his own safety, but that of his wife as well. For,
think what he would, he could not shake off the feeling that a man so
cowardly as to resort to the assassination of a man would not be over
particular even if it should chance to be a woman. Philip was man enough
to be entirely unshaken by anonymous threats. A thousand a day would not
have unnerved him in the least. He would have writhed under the sense of
the great sin which they revealed, but that is all the effect they would
have had.

When it came to his wife, however, that was another question. For a
moment he felt like sending in his resignation and moving out of Milton
as soon as possible. But he finally decided that he ought to remain; and
Mrs. Strong did not oppose his decision when once he had declared his
resolve. She knew Philip must do what to him was the will of his Master,
and with that finally she was content.

She had overcome her nervousness and dread now that Philip's courageous
presence strengthened her, and she began to tell him that he had better
hunt for the man who had appeared so mysteriously in the study.

"I haven't convinced myself yet that there is any man. Confess, Sarah,
that you dreamed all that."

"I did not," replied his wife, a little indignantly. "Do you think I
wrote those letters and stuck that knife into the desk myself?"

"Of course not. But how could a