"Only God can help you, Mrs. Temple, and I pray that His grace may be
sufficient for you."

"But you forget that I have no God."

"Mrs. Temple, you are beside yourself. No God?"

"No! He is afar off, or I am shut out from Him. I have never known Him.
I cannot pray to Him."

"When you shall be more collected I will call again. Meantime, you will
find much comfort in our Book of Common Prayer. Have recourse to it and
to the throne of grace."

Juliet abandoned herself as much to remorse as to grief.

She had had the best of husbands; she had been to him the worst of
wives. As in a mirror, she saw all her past life. She remembered how
fretful and fault-finding she had been; how difficult to please, how
unlovely she had made herself. If John could come back, only just long
enough for her to tell him how very, very sorry she was, how much she
loved and respected him, how he had always done everything right, and
she had been ever in the wrong; but he could not come even for that. She
collected around her the various articles he had used; among others, his
rosary, crucifix and prayer-book. How careful he had been to keep them
hidden away, where they might not offend her eye, or provoke her
ridicule and sneer. She read every day, in the "Following of Christ,"
the chapter John had last read, which the faded rose still marked.

In this was a kind of comfort, but there was peace nor rest in aught
else. She walked the floor distractedly, and wrung her hands and tore
her garments. She shut herself up in the darkness, and stretched forth
her hands and prayed the spirit of John to come back to her in pity. She
would not admit her sisters; her children she allowed to grieve alone.

Suddenly, came back to her the memory of a look of pity and compassion,
which she had forgotten. When she had returned, on that memorable day,
to her husband, who had just breathed his last, as she raised her eyes,
scarcely daring to let them fall upon the dear face, she encountered the
gaze of Father Duffy. He had, unconsciously, looked upon this bereaved
woman, whom he knew to be without the fold, therefore, without suitable
consolation for this trying moment, as our dear Lord may be supposed to
have looked upon Mary and Martha, when they informed Him that Lazarus,
their brother, was dead.

The remembrance of this compassionate look softened Juliet's heart
toward the priest. For the first time in her life, she began to think he
might be someth