"Ay so?" quoth she. "And how, then, of thine hope for the life beyond, where they never rest, yet are never weary?"

"Mistress," saith he, "the sinner that hath been pardoned a debt of ten thousand talents may have peace, but can scarce dare rise to hope."

"I am alway fain when a man reckoneth his debt heavy," saith Aunt _Joyce_. "We be mostly so earnest to persuade ourselves that we owe no farthing beyond an hundred pence."

"I could never persuade myself of that," saith he, shaking his white head. "I have plunged too deep in the mire to have any chance to doubt the conditions of my clothing."

It struck me that his manner of speech was something beyond a common beggar, and I could not but marvel if he had seen better days.

"And what askest, friend?" saith Aunt _Joyce_, winch turned away from him and busied herself with casting small twigs on the fire.

"A few waste victuals, if it like you, Mistress. They will be better than I deserve."

"And if it like me not?" saith Aunt _Joyce_, suddenly, turning back to him, and methought there was a little trembling in her voice.

"Then," saith he, "I will trouble you no further."

"Then," saith she, to mine amaze, "I tell thee plainly I will not give them to such a sinner as thou hast been, by thine own confession."

"Be it so," he saith quietly, bowing his white head. "I cry you mercy for having troubled you, and I wish you a good morrow."

"That shalt thou never," came from Aunt _Joyce_, in a voice which was not hers. "Didst thou count _I_ was blind? _Leonard_, _Leonard_!"

And she clasped his hands in hers, and drew him back to the fireside.

"'Bring forth the best robe, and put it on him; and bring hither the fatted calf, and kill it; and let us eat and be merry. For this my love was dead, and is alive again; and was lost, and is found.' My G.o.d, I thank Thee!"

And then, out of the white hair and the blind blue eyes, slowly came back to me the face of that handsome gentleman which had so near beguiled our _Milisent_ to her undoing, and had wrought such ill in _Derwentdale_.

"_Joyce_!" he saith, in a greatly agitated voice. "I would never have come hither, had I reckoned thou shouldst wit me."

"Thou wert out of thy reckoning, then," she answereth. "I tell thee, as I told _Dulcie_ years agone, that were I low laid in my grave, I should hear thy step upon the mould above me."

"I came," he saith, "but to hear thy voice once afore I die. Look upon thy face can I never more. But I thought to hear the voice of the only woman which ever loved me in very truth, and unto whom my wrong-doing is the heaviest sin in all my black calendar."

"Pardoned sin should not be heavy," saith she.

"Nay," quoth Mr _Norris_, "but it is the heaviest of all."

"Come in, _Leonard_," saith Aunt _Joyce_, tenderly.

"Nay, my merciful _Joyce_, let me not trouble thee," saith he, "for if thou canst not see it in my face, I know in mine heart that I am struck for death."

"I have seen it," she made answer. "And thou shalt spend thy last days no whither but in the Manor House at _Minster Lovel_, nor with any other nurse nor sister than _Joyce Morrell_. _Leonard_, for forty years I have prayed for this day. Dash not the cup from my lips ere I have well tasted its sweetness."

I caught a low murmur from Mr _Norris'_ lips, "Pa.s.sing the love of women!" Then he held out his hand, and Aunt _Joyce_ drew it upon her arm and led him into her privy parlour.

I left them alone till she called me. To that interview there should be no third save G.o.d.

Nor was it much that I heard at after. Some dread accident had happed him, at after which his sight had departed, and his hair had gone white in a few weeks. He had counted himself so changed that none should know him. I doubt if he should not have been hid safe enough from any eyes save hers.

He lived about three months thereafter. Never in all my life saw I man that spake of his past life with more loathing and contrition. Even in death, raptures of thanksgiving had he none. He could not, as it seemed, rise above an humble trust that G.o.d would be as good as His word, and that for _Christ's_ sake he that had confessed his sins and forsaken them should find mercy.

He alway said that it was one word of Aunt _Joyce_ that had given him even so much hope. She had said to him, that day in the copse, after she had sent away _Milisent_ and me,--"I shall never give thee up, _Leonard_. I shall never cease praying for thee, till I know thou art beyond all prayer."

"It was those prayers, _Joyce_, that brought me back," he said. "After mine accident, I had been borne into a cot by the way-side, where as I lay abed in the back chamber, I could not but hear the goodman every day read the _Scriptures_ to his household. Those _Scriptures_ seethed in mine heart, and thy prayers were alway with me. It was as though they fitted one into the other. I thought thou hadst prayed me into that cot, for I might have been carried into some G.o.dless house where no such thing should have chanced me. But ever and anon, mixed with G.o.d's Word, I heard thy words, and thy voice seemed as if it called to me,--'Come back! come back!' I thought, if there were so much love and mercy in thee, there must be some left in G.o.d."

The night that Mr _Norris_ was buried in the churchyard of _Minster Lovel_, as we sat again our two selves by the fireside, Aunt _Joyce_ saith to me, or may-be to herself--

"I should think I may go now."

"Whither, _Aunt_?" said I.

"Home, _Edith_," she made answer. "Home--to _Leonard_ and _Anstace_, and to _Christ_. The work that was set me is done. '_Nunc dimittis, Domine_!'"

"Dear Aunt _Joyce_," said I, "I want you for ever so long yet."

"If thou verily do, _Edith_," saith she, "I shall have to tarry. And surely, she that hath borne forty years' travel in the darkness, can stand a few days' more journeying in the light. I know that when the right time cometh, my Father will not forget me. The children may by times feel eager to reach home, but the Father's heart longeth the most to have them all safe under His shelter."

And very gravely she added--"'They that were ready went in with Him to the wedding: and the gate was shut up.'"

THE END.