"My child!" he exclaimed, and then, more calmly, "you know well what I meant. We all know perfectly that there is a leprosy of soul as well as of body, for which on this side death we see no cure, of which even God must see that the world would be well rid. We cannot act on our belief; we leave it in His hands." "Don't say it! Don't even hint at such a thing again!" In a moment she exclaimed, in a voice of tears, "What does God care? Ah me! when I look back and see my childhood--such high hope, such trustful prayer! Who gave that heart of hope but the God of whom you speak? Who taught the little soul the courage to trust and pray? And the hope is dead, the courage crushed, the prayers--may my worst enemy be saved from such answer, if answer there is, to prayer!" She leaned her head against a tree, sobbing bitterly. He supposed that 'Dolphus, bringing memories of a previous time, had unnerved her. "You had a happy childhood." He spoke soothingly, hardly with interrogation. She looked up fiercely. "You call God a father! It was my father who taught me to pray. He--ah! you cannot think how beautiful he was, how loving, how fond of all beautiful things! He taught me to pray for him. He said that he could not pray for himself--that he had no faith. I knelt by his knee every day, and prayed, as he taught me, for him and for sister and for myself, but most of all for him. Then Hermie became religious--dear, gentle, self-denying sister--and I cannot doubt that she spent half her time in prayer for him because he wasn't converted." "And he died?" asked Durgan. "Yes; he died." It seemed to him that she shuddered. "Had you ever anything to do with people who believe that the dead can return to speak to us, or appear to us?" She raised her head and looked at him with interest. "I once knew a man," continued Durgan, "who believed in such things, who saw such visions." "Do you mean the man called Charlton Beardsley?" Durgan was much surprised by hearing the name of his wife's protégé from such a source. "I should not have supposed that you had ever even heard his name. When he came to this country you must have been at school." "I had just left school. Tell me what he was like. Was he bad or good?" "I thought him simple, and much mistaken." "Was he a wicked man?" "I did not think him so then; I have not seen him since." "He lives with Mrs. Durgan now, and is a great invalid. Surely you must know if he is a wicked man?" "Was it the Blounts who told you about him?" "Yes--Mr. Blount mentioned it before you came"--he thought her words came with hesitation--"but I have wanted to ask you. He was called a mesmerist, too--do you believe that one man's will could possess another person, and make that person do--well, any wicked thing?"