For the last year it had been his custom to receive the sacrament on the first Sunday of the month. He had risen early, and had walked across the dewy fields to the old parish church, and had knelt among the people who knew him, and had felt himself all the better for that mystic office, even when things were going far from well with him. There was much that was blameworthy in his life; yet he had not felt himself too base a creature to kneel among his fellow-sinners at the altar of the Sinner's Friend. It was a shock, therefore, to receive a letter from the Rector on the last day of August, requesting him to absent himself from the communion service on the following Sunday, lest his presence before that altar should be a scandal to the other communicants. * * * * * "God forbid that I should condemn any man unheard," wrote the Rector; "but you can hardly be unaware of the terrible scandal attaching to your name. You have not come to me, as I hoped you would come, to explain the conduct which has given rise to that scandal. You have taken no step to set yourself right before your fellow-men. Can you wonder that your own silence has been in somewise your condemnation? My duty to my flock compels me to warn you that, until you have taken some steps to free your character from the shadow that now darkens it, you must not approach the altar of your parish church. "If you will come to me, and open your heart to me, as the sinner should to his priest, I may be able to counsel and to help you. If you can clear yourself to me, I will be your advocate with your fellow-parishioners.----Always your friend, "JOHN MONKHOUSE." * * * * * "He did wisely to write," said Bothwell, crushing the letter in his clenched fist. "If he had spoken such words as those to me, I believe I should have knocked him down, priest though he is." He answered the Rector's letter within an hour after receiving it. * * * * * "I have nothing to confess," he wrote, "and that is why I have not gone to your confessional. The difficulties and perplexities of my life are such as could only be understood by a man of my own age and surroundings. They would be darker than Sanscrit to clerical gray hairs. "Because I did not choose to answer questions which I could not answer without betraying the confidence of a friend, my wise fellow-parishioners have agreed to suspect me of murdering a girl whose face I never saw till after her death. "I shall attend to receive the sacrament at the eight-o'clock service next Sunday, and I dare you to refuse to administer it.----I have the honour to be, yours, &c. BOTHWELL GRAHAME." * * * * *