r solemn
austerity when he spoke to the lost sheep--as there might not have been
in the sterner years.

"The way of the transgressor is hard, grievously hard, Thomas. I think
you are already finding it so, are you not?"

Tom shook his head slowly.

"That doesn't mean what it used to, to me, Uncle Silas; nothing means
the same any more. It's just as if somebody had hit that part of me with
a club; it's all numb and dead. I'm sure of only one thing now: that is,
that I'm not going to be a hypocrite after this, if I can help it."

The man put his hand on the boy's knee.

"Have you been that all along, Thomas?"

"I reckon so,"--monotonously. "At first it was partly scare, and partly
because I knew what mother wanted. But ever since I've been big enough
to think, I've been asking why, and, as you would say, doubting."

Silas Crafts was silent for a moment. Then he said:

"You have come to the years of discretion, Thomas, and you have chosen
death rather than life. If you go on as you have begun, you will bring
the gray hairs of your father and mother in sorrow to the grave.
Leaving your own soul's salvation out of the question, can you go on and
drag an upright, honorable name in the dust and mire of degradation?"

"No," said Tom definitely. "And what's more, I don't mean to. I don't
know what Doctor Tollivar wrote you about me, and it doesn't make any
difference now. That's over and done with. You haven't been seeing me
every day for these three weeks without knowing that I'm ashamed of it."

"Ashamed of the consequences, you mean, Thomas. You are not repentant."

"Yes, I am, Uncle Silas; though maybe not in your way. I don't allow to
make a fool of myself again."

The preacher's comment was a groan.

"Tom, my boy, if any one had told me a year ago that a short twelvemonth
would make you, not only an apostate to the faith, but a shameless liar
as well--"

Tom started as if he had been struck with a whip.

"Hold on, Uncle Silas," he broke in hardily. "That's mighty near a
fighting word, even between blood kin. When have you ever caught me in a
lie?"

"Now!" thundered the accusing voice; "this moment! You have been giving
me to understand that your sinful rebellion at Beersheba was the worst
that could be charged against you. Answer me: isn't that what you want
me to believe?"

"I don't care whether you believe it or not. It's so."

"It is not so. Here, at your own home, when your mother had just been
s