‘My good soul, you will be the next if you fret and frighten yourself like this. Does not God take care of us all? Those who are taken are in His keeping as truly as those He leaves behind. In life or death we are with Him. Why should Emmanuel be the next? He is sober and cleanly. He is better cared for in every way than his neighbours.’ ‘Oh, Mr. Culverhouse, I love him so, he is all the world to me. I could not live without him. I have watched him grow up, as a child watches the one flower in his little garden. Every day and hour of his life has been precious to me. My only grief has been that he should set his face against the Bible. And now perhaps God is angry with him--God must be angry at unbelief--and will snatch him away from me.’ ‘That would be to punish you. God is all just. He will give your son time to grow wiser.’ ‘Oh, sir, it is not always so. The wicked man is cut off in the day of his iniquity. My son has denied God, and may be smitten in his pride. The poor young mother taken away from her babies, one that can only just crawl, and the other six weeks old! Why should Heaven pity me more than those babies?’ ‘Because the loss must be harder for you. Some kind soul will care for the babies.’ ‘True, sir, one of them was laughing and crowing an hour ago. They don’t know what death means. But Emmanuel is my all. At night when he lays down his book and talks to me for a little bit, I sit and drink in his words as if they were wine, warming and strengthening me. His poetry seems grander to me than any other poet’s. Yes, grander than Milton or Shakespeare. I think God meant him to be great.’ ‘I believe God meant him to be good.’ ‘Oh, Mr. Culverhouse, my mind is full of care when I think of him. My husband believed that some were chosen vessels of wrath. I have sometimes fancied that Emmanuel must be such a one. To be so gifted, and yet to deny God! To be so good to me--the best and kindest of sons--and yet to be stubborn against his God. I cannot understand it.’ ‘Can you not understand the case of a man to whom Heaven has given a searching and inquiring spirit--a mind not satisfied to be taught by others--wanting to find out everything for itself? Such a man, not having searched deep enough, may be still in the dark; but when he has lived longer, and thought more, the light will come. Be sure of that.’ ‘Do you believe that, Mr. Culverhouse?’ ‘Honestly. I give Emmanuel another year for his infidel opinions, and at the end of that time I expect to see him testifying to his belief in Christianity, like the apostle Paul, as ardent in faith as he has been ardent in disbelief.’ ‘What comfort you have given me!’ sighed the widow.