She gave a smothered scream, and hid her face in her hands. Mrs. Robertson, weeping herself, sought to comfort her, but it seemed in vain. “The worst of it is,” Isy resumed, “—for I must confess everything, ma’am!—is that I cannot tell what I may have done in the drink. I may even have told his name, though I remember nothing about it! It must be months, I think, since I tasted a drop till last night; and now I’ve done it again, and I’m not fit he should ever cast a look at me! My heart’s just like to break when I think I may have been false to him, as well as false to his child! If all the devils would but come and tear me, I would say, thank ye, sirs!” “My dear,” came the voice of the parson from where he sat listening to every word she uttered, “my dear, naething but the han’ o’ the Son o’ Man’ll come nigh ye oot o’ the dark, saft-strokin yer hert, and closin up the terrible gash intil’t. I’ the name o’ God, the saviour o’ men, I tell ye, dautie, the day ’ill come whan ye’ll smile i’ the vera face o’ the Lord himsel, at the thoucht o’ what he has broucht ye throuw! Lord Christ, haud a guid grup o’ thy puir bairn and hers, and gie her back her ain. Thy wull be deen!—and that thy wull’s a’ for redemption!—Gang on wi’ yer tale, my lassie.” “’Deed, sir, I can say nae mair—and seem to hae nae mair to say.—I’m some—some sick like!” She fell back on the sofa, white as death. The parson was a big man; he took her up in his arms, and carried her to a room they had always ready on the chance of a visit from “one of the least of these.” At the top of the stair stood their little daughter, a child of five or six, wanting to go down to her mother, and wondering why she was not permitted. “Who is it, moder?” she whispered, as Mrs. Robertson passed her, following her husband and Isy. “Is she very dead?” “No, darling,” answered her mother; “it is an angel that has lost her way, and is tired—so tired!—You must be very quiet, and not disturb her. Her head is going to ache very much.” The child turned and went down the stair, step by step, softly, saying— “I will tell my rabbit not to make any noise—and to be as white as he can.” Once more they succeeded in bringing back to the light of consciousness her beclouded spirit. She woke in a soft white bed, with two faces of compassion bending over her, closed her eyes again with a smile of sweet content, and was soon wrapt in a wholesome slumber.