He stood quite still like a man expecting a sudden attack. When none came and the stillness remained unbroken, the strained, eager light died slowly out of his face. He appeared rather disappointed than relieved. Reluctantly he turned around, and with the revolver still in his hand but hidden beneath the skirts of his coat, made his way up the white hill towards the Vicarage. He must have walked quickly, for although I hurried, and my way back was the shorter, he was already at our gate when I emerged from the plantation. As he stooped to adjust the fastening I heard him groan, and bending forward I caught a glimpse of his face. I must have cried out, only my lips seemed palsied as though I were but a sleeping figure in some terrible nightmare. His face was like the face of a dead man. He seemed to have aged by at least a dozen years. As he hastened up the little drive, his walk, usually so dignified and elastic, became a shamble. It seemed to me that this was but the wreck of the man who had left us only a few days before. CHAPTER VIII THE COMING OF MR. BERDENSTEIN There are days marked in our lives with white stones. We can never forget them. Recollections, a very easy effort of memory, seem to bring back even in some measure the very thrill, the same pulsations and emotions, as were kindled into life by certain never-to-be-forgotten happenings. Time cannot weaken them. Whilst we have life the memory of them is eternal. And there are other days against the memory of which we have dropped a black stone. We shrink from anything which may recall them. No sacrifice would seem too great if only we could set the seal of oblivion upon those few hated hours. We school ourselves to close our eyes, and turn our heads away from anything which might in any manner recall them to us. Yet we are powerless. Ghosts of them steal light-footed, detested and uninvited guests, across our fairest moments; the chill of winter shakes us on the most brilliant of midsummer days; the color steals from our cheeks, and our blood runs to water. We are at the mercy of those touches of icy reminiscence. There is no escape from them. There never will be any escape. The Sunday which followed my father’s visit to London is one of those hideous memories. In the calendar of my life it is marked with the blackest of black stones. I only pray that such another day as that may never find its way into my life.