“Sir,” said Elijah, “you do me less than justice, and... insult me. What right have you to ask me such a question? I have preached, and I will preach again; but there's a time for preaching, and a time to refrain from preaching. I can swim, and I have saved two lives in my time. I am a fool for boasting, but I would...” “I believe you would, Mr. Higginbotham”--I saw an able-bodied man without fear--“and I beg your pardon...” Elijah waved his hand. I was to go on to the end without delay. “It seemed fifteen minutes, it was only one, while the mother hung over the edge of the black seething whirlpool, and then he came up, bleeding from a wound in the forehead, without Elsie.” “I take you to witness,” declared Elijah solemnly, “that I said he was a brave man. Yes, he had the natural virtues, and some who make a profession have none.” “For a few seconds he hung on to the edge to get breath, and Mrs. Macfadyen herself besought him not to risk his life, for he was a husband and father; but he only answered: 'I'll hae Elsie oot'.” “They forgot themselves,--do you mark that?--both of them,” cried Elijah. “Whose Spirit was that? Didn't they keep the commandment of Love, which is the chief commandment? and--answer me--can any one keep that commandment without grace?” It was not with me but with himself the evangelist was arguing, and I went on: “He came up again, this time with Elsie in one arm, a poor, little limp bundle of clothes, her yellow hair spread over her face, and her eyes closed, I was afraid, for ever.” “But she lived, didn't she?” There was no Elijah Higginbotham anywhere to be found now, only an excited man, concerned about the saving of a little maid. “Excuse me, I didn't read that part about the saving so carefully as I ought I was more concerned about... the judgment.” “Yes, Elsie was all right in a day or two, but Posty had not strength to do more than hand her to her mother, and then, exhausted by the struggle with the water, he fell back, and was dead when he was found.” “What were you doing that you did not lay hold of Posty and pull him out?” thundered Elijah; “you seem to have been there.” “Only in a literary sense,” I hastened to explain, for it now seemed likely that the evangelist having come to condemn Posty, was about to take up the cudgels on his behalf. “I wish to Heaven you had been there in a physical sense; you would have been far more useful!” replied Elijah. “And so he died and Elsie was saved?” “Yes, Posty died and went to his account; that was how he lived, and that was how he died.” And I waited. Elijah sprang out of his seat and stood on the hearthrug, his face flushed, and his eyes shining. “It's a pity that he tasted; I wish he hadn't It's a pity he did not think more about his own soul; I wish he had. But Posty was a hero, and played the man that day. Posty will have another chance. Posty loved, and God is Love; if there's such a thing as justice, it's all right with Posty.”