For what did He tell the sin-laden woman who came to him once, and dared not look into his face? Was ever soul so foul and crimson-stained that he could not make it pure and white? Does he not linger till his locks are wet with the dews of night, to listen for the first, faint call of any wanderer crying to him in the dark? So He came to Maggie. So he called her by her name,--Magdalene, most precious to him; whom he had bought with a great price; for whom, with groanings that cannot be uttered, he had pleaded with his Father: Magdalene, chosen from all eternity, to be graven in the hollow of his hand, to stand near to him before the throne, to look with fearless eyes into his face, to touch him with her happy tears among his sinless ones forever. And think you that _then_, any should scorn the woman whom the high and lofty One, beholding, did thus love? Who could lay anything to the charge of his elect? Perhaps he told her all this, in the pauses of the storm, for something in her face transfigured it. "Mother, it's all over now. I think I shall be your little girl again." And so, with a smile, she went to Him. The light flashed broader and brighter about the room, and on the dead face there,--never Meg's again. A strong man, bowed over it, was weeping. Muff moaned out his brute sorrow where the still hand touched him. But Martha Ryck, kneeling down beside her only child, gave thanks to God. What Was the Matter? I could not have been more than seven or eight years old, when it happened; but it might have been yesterday. Among all other childish memories, it stands alone. To this very day it brings with it the old, utter sinking of the heart, and the old, dull sense of mystery. To read what I have to say, you should have known my mother. To understand it, you should understand her. But that is quite impossible now, for there is a quiet spot over the hill, and past the church, and beside the little brook where the crimsoned mosses grow thick and wet and cool, from which I cannot call her. It is all I have left of her now. But after all, it is not of her that you will chiefly care to hear. My object is simply to acquaint you with a few facts, which, though interwoven with the events of her life, are quite independent of it as objects of interest. It is, I know, only my own heart that makes these pages a memorial,--but, you see, I cannot help it. Yet, I confess, no glamour of any earthly love has ever entirely dazzled me,--not even hers. Of imperfections, of mistakes, of sins, I knew she was guilty. I know it now; even with the sanctity of those crimsoned mosses, and the hush of the rest beneath, so close to my heart, I cannot forget them. Yet somehow--I do not know how--the imperfections, the mistakes, the very sins, bring her nearer to me as the years slip by, and make her dearer.