‘Thank God! yes—He has dragged me through! But it did not seem so in one’s sleep, nor waking neither—though sleep is worst, and happily there was not much of that! Sit down, Ted; I want to look at you. I can’t believe it is not three weeks since I saw you last.’ We talked it all out, and I came to some perception of the fearful ordeal it had been—first, in the decision neither to shut his eyes, nor to conceal that they were open; and then in the lack of presence of mind and the sense of confusion that always beset him when browbeaten and talked down, so that, in the critical contest with Tooke, he felt as if his feet were slipping from under him, and what had once been clear to him was becoming dim, so that he had only been assured that he had held his ground by Tooke’s redoubled persuasions and increased anger. And for a clerk, whose years were only twenty-one, to oppose a manager, who had been in the service more than the whole of that space, was preposterous insolence, and likely to result in the utter ruin of his own prospects, and the character he had begun to retrieve. It was just after this, the real crisis, that he had the only dream which had not been misery and distress. In it she—she yonder—yes, the lady with the lamp, came and stood by him, and said, ‘Be steadfast.’ ‘It was a dream,’ said Clarence. ‘She was not as she is in the mullion room, not crying, but with a sweet, sad look, almost like Miss Fordyce—if Miss Fordyce ever looked sad. It was only a dream.’ Yet it had so refreshed and comforted him that we have often since discussed whether the spirit really visited him, or whether this was the manner in which conscience and imagination acted on his brain. Indeed, he always believed that the dream had been either heaven-sent or heaven-permitted. The die had been cast in that interview when he had let it be seen that he was dangerous, and could not be bought over. The after consequences had been the terrible distress and temptation I have before described, only most inadequately. ‘But that,’ said Clarence, half smiling, ‘only came of my being such a wretched creature as I am. There, dear old Miss Newton saved me—yes, she did—most unconsciously, dear old soul. Don’t you remember how Griff used to say she maundered over the text. Well, she did it all the way home in my ear, as she clung to my arm—“Be strong, and He shall comfort thine heart.” And then I knew my despair and determination to leave it all behind were a temptation—“the old story,” as you told me, and I prayed God to help me, and just managed to fight it out. Thank God for her!’