I realized that the moment was critical and concentrated all my spiritual power in an appeal to Penelope, praying that God would bring her back and make her heed my words. I spoke gently of God's love for His children and said that we need fear no evil within us or about us, no dangers of any sort, if we will learn to draw to us and through us that healing and protecting love. We can do this, we must do this by establishing a love-current from God to us and from us to God, by keeping it flowing just as an electrician keeps an electrical current flowing--every day, every hour. It is not enough to pray for God's love, we must keep our spiritual connections right, exactly as an electrician keeps his electrical connections right, if we expect the current to flow. We cannot make our electric lamps burn by merely wishing them to burn, although there is a boundless ocean of electricity waiting to be drawn upon. We must know how to tap that ocean. Similarly, the power of God's infinite love will not descend upon us simply because we need it or ask for it. We must ask for it in the right way. We must establish the right love-connections. We must set the love-current flowing, and keep it flowing, _from God to us and from us back to God_; and this can be done only by confessing our sins, by cleansing our hearts of evil thoughts and desires. _Not even God Himself can make the sun shine upon those who wilfully hide in the shadows!_ I saw that they were listening impatiently and more than once Roberta tried to interrupt me, but I persisted and said what I had to say as well as I could, with all the love in my heart, for I knew that my precious Penelope's fate was hanging in the balance. When I had finished Roberta got up from the bed where she had been sitting and lighted a cigarette. "Now, then, it's my turn," she began. I could see her eyes shining with an evil purpose. "You've heard her pretty little speech, Pen. You've heard her talk about the wonderful power of God's love, and a great rigamarole about how it guards us from all evil, if we say our prayers and confess our sins and so on. I say that is all bunk, and I can prove it. Take women--they've always said their prayers more than men, always confessed their sins more than men, always been more loving than men, haven't they? And what's the result? Has God protected them from the evils of life more than men? He has not. God has let women get the worst of it right straight along through the centuries. Women have always been the slaves of men, haven't they?--in spite of all their love and devotion, in spite of all their prayers and tears? How do you account for that?" She flashed this at me with a wicked little toss of her head and Penelope chimed in: "Yes, I'd like to know that myself." But, when I tried to answer, Roberta cut me off with a new flood of violence.