This, however, was not the only cause for Morris Pugh's uneasiness. Oddly enough, the disturbing element was the hundred pounds which Ned Blackborough had hidden in the cleft of the rocks. The last two months had been one long temptation to go and take it at all costs--take it and say nothing. And yet his soul revolted from the very idea. The constant conflict, however, had forced him into clearer thought, and he had shrunk back in horror from much that he saw in himself and others. The greed of gold! How it riddled all human life; it even touched the next, for it was the mainspring of religion. Money! Money! There was a perpetual call for it. Half the spiritual life of his flock was due to the efforts of those who had built the chapel and who worked--for God, no doubt--but also to get five per cent. interest on their mortgages. Yes! the souls for whom Christ died were bartering them for gold. O! for something, some voicing of the Great Spirit, to stir them to a nobler commerce! This was his desire, his constant prayer, and he had grown haggard and anxious over the stress of both. The last two days also had brought a fresh anxiety. Mervyn, his brother, had returned from a month's visit to Blackborough, curiously moody, curiously unlike himself; that is the earnest, clever lad who for years had been the pride of the village, the joy of his mother's and of his brother's heart. No doubt his failure to pass the examination had discouraged him; but was that all? It did not really matter; he was young yet, had another chance, and meanwhile could go on as he was, earning enough to keep him as clerk to the village councils and boards. So as Morris Pugh, hollow-eyed, pale, lingered at the grave of the little child which he had just committed to the dust whence it had come, there was no stability in his thoughts. They wandered on dreamily until, suddenly as a flash, came the certainty that one of the many mourners, who had but a minute before been looking down on the tiny coffin, was father to what it held. And he had stood there silent, unrepentant! Yes; it must be so, for poor Gwen was no wanderer; her own people sufficed for that limited life. He covered his face with his hands and turned swiftly, almost to stumble over his brother who stood behind him. His face was haggard also, and Morris looked at it with a quick dread clutching at his heart. "There's--there's nothing wrong is there--Merve--" he faltered. The lad flushed crimson. "Only you've trodden on my toe; that's all," he answered, bending low to brush off the dust of the grave which his brother's foot had left on his boot. "I beg your pardon," replied Morris Pugh slowly; then the remembrance that he was pastor here as elsewhere made him add, "I was so overcome by the horrible thought that the father of that poor child must have been here--beside us, Merve." But the lad's face was up again; he looked his brother calmly in the face.