Again she rung the bell.

"Does no one know of your being out?" asked the watchman.

"All are asleep in the house," replied Mrs. Howland.

At this the watchman came up the steps, and struck two or three heavy blows upon the door with his mace, the sound of which went reverberating through the house, and startling Mr. Howland from his slumber. But not perceiving immediately that his wife was absent from her place by his side, and thinking that his son had renewed his efforts to gain admission, the latter did not make a motion to rise. In a few moments, however, the repeated strokes of the mace, to which was added the loud call of a man in the street below caused him to start up in bed. He then perceived that his wife was not by his side. With an exclamation, he sprang upon the floor, and throwing up the window, called out--

"Who's there?"

"Come down and open the door," was answered by the watchman.

"Who wants to come in?" asked Mr. Howland, his mind beginning by this time to get a little clear from the confusion into which it was at first thrown.

"I do," replied a voice that threw all into bewilderment again.

"Bless me! What does this mean!" exclaimed Mr. Howland, aloud, yet speaking to himself.

"Open the door, quickly," called out Mrs. Howland, in a tone of distress. "Come down and let me in."

Hurriedly Mr. Howland now dressed himself and went down. As he opened the door, his wife glided past him, and ran up stairs. The watchman retired without speaking to the confused and astonished husband, who, recovering his presence of mind, reclosed the door and followed his wife to their chamber.

"Esther! What is the meaning of all this?" asked Mr. Howland, with much severity of manner.

But there was no reply.

"Will you speak?" said he, in a tone of authority.

The home-tyrant had gone a step too far. The meek, patient, long-suffering, much enduring wife, was in no state of mind to bear further encroachments in the direction from which they were now coming. Suddenly she raised herself up from whence she had fallen across the bed, and looking at her husband with an expression that caused him to step back a pace, involuntarily answered.

"By what authority do you speak to me thus?"

"By the authority vested in me as your husband," was promptly answered.

"I was on G.o.d's errand, Mr. Howland; searching after the weak, the simple, and the erring! Have you anything to say against the mission? Does your authority reach above His?"

And the mother, lifting her hand, pointed trembling finger upward, while she fixed an eye upon her husband so steady that his own sunk beneath its gaze.

For the s.p.a.ce of nearly a minute, the att.i.tude of neither changed, nor was the silence broken. Twice during the time did Mr. Howland lift his eyes to those of his wife, and each time did they fall, after a few moments, under the strange half-defiant look they encountered. At last he said firmly, yet in a more subdued, though rebuking voice,

"This to me, Esther?"

"Am I not a mother?" was asked in response to this, yet without a perceptible tremor in her voice.

"You are a wife, as well as a mother," replied Mr. Howland, "and, as a wife, are under a sacred obligation to regard the authority committed to your husband by G.o.d."

"Have I not just said to you," returned Mrs. Howland, "that I was on G.o.d's errand? Does your authority go beyond His?"

"When did He speak to you?" There was a covert sneer in the tone with which this half impious interrogation was made.

"I heard his still, small voice in my mother's heart," replied Mrs.

Howland, meekly, "and I went forth obedient thereto, to seek the straying child you had so harshly and erringly turned from your door: thus does G.o.d shut the door of Heaven against no wandering one who comes to it and knocks for entrance."

"Esther! I will not hear such language from your lips!" There was an unsteadiness in the voice of Mr. Howland, that marked the effect his wife's unexpected and searching words had produced.

"Then do not seek to stand between me and my duty as a mother," was her firm reply. "Too long, already, have you placed yourself between me and this duty. But that time is past."

As Mrs. Howland uttered these words, she pa.s.sed across the room to a window, which she threw up, and leaning her body out, looked earnestly up and down the street. For a reaction like this Mr.

Howland was not prepared. He was, in fact, utterly confounded. Had there been the smallest sign of irresolution on the part of his wife--the nearest appearance of weakness in the will so suddenly opposed to his own--he would have known what to do. But nothing of this was apparent, and he hesitated about advancing again to the contest, while there was so strong a doubt as to the issue.

For a long time Mr. Howland moved about the room, while his wife continued to sit, listening, at the window.

"Come, Esther," said the former, at length, in a voice greatly changed from its tone when he last spoke. "You had better retire. It is useless to remain there. Besides, you are in danger of taking cold. The air is damp and chilly."

"You can retire--I shall sleep none, to-night," was answered to this. And then Mrs. Howland looked again from the window.

"Where--where can he have gone?" she said aloud, though speaking to herself. "My poor, unhappy boy!"

Mr. Howland made no answer to this. He had no satisfying intelligence to offer, nor any words of comfort that it would be of avail to speak.

Thus the greater portion of that long remembered night was pa.s.sed--Mrs. Howland sitting at the window, vainly waiting and watching for her son, and Mr. Howland walking the floor of the room, his mind given up to troubled and rebuking thoughts. In his hardness and self-will he had justified himself up to this in his course of conduct pursued toward his children; but he was in doubt now. A question as to whether he had been right or not had come into his mind, and disturbed him to the very centre.

CHAPTER VIII.

WHEN Mr. Howland threatened his son with exclusion from the house, if he were away at ten o'clock, Andrew's feelings were in a state of reaction against his father, and he said to himself, in a rebellious spirit--

"We'll see if you will."

But after growing cooler, he came into a better state of mind; and, in view of consequences such as he knew would be visited on him, decided not to come in contact with his father in this particular--at least not for the present. If turned from his own door at midnight, where was he to find shelter? This question he could not answer to his own satisfaction.

After supper, on the evening succeeding that in which he had visited the theatre, Andrew left home and went to an engine-house in the neighborhood, where he joined about a dozen lads and young men as idle and aimless as himself. With these he spent an hour or two, entering into their vicious and debasing conversation, when a person with whom he had gone to see the play on the previous evening, proposed to him to go around to the theatre again. Andrew objected that he had no money, but the other said that he could easily procure checks, and volunteered to ask for them. Still Andrew, whose thoughts were on the pa.s.sing time, refused to go. He meant to be home before the clock struck ten.

"Come round with me, then," urged the lad.

"What time is it?" asked Andrew.

"Only a little after nine o'clock," was replied.

"Are you certain?"

"Oh, yes. I heard the clock strike a short time ago. It isn't more than a quarter past nine."

"I thought it was later than that."

"No. It's early yet; so, come along. I want to talk to you."

Thus urged, Andrew went with the boy. The theatre was some distance away. Just as they reached it, a clock was heard to strike.