* * *

In horror--in shame--ay, in shame so deep I flushed and dared not look
at him--I flung off his arms. And I sprang away--desperately fingering
my collar: for it seemed I must choke, so was my throat filled with
indignation. "You wicked man!" I cried. "You kissed my sister.
You--_you_--kissed my sister!"

"Davy!"

"You wicked, wicked man!"

"Don't, Davy!"

"Go 'way!" I screamed.

Rather, he came towards me, opening his arms, beseeching me. But I was
hot-headed and willful, being only a lad, without knowledge of sin
gained by sinning, and, therefore, having no compassion; and, still, I
fell away from him, but he followed, continuing to beseech me, until, at
last, I struck him on the breast: whereupon, he winced, and turned away.
Then, in a flash--in the still, illuminating instant that follows a blow
struck in blind rage--I was appalled by what I had done; and I stood
stiff, my hands yet clinched, a storm of sobs on the point of breaking:
hating him and myself and all the world, because of the wrong he had
done us, and the wrong I had done him, and the wrong that life had
worked us all.

I took to my heels.

"Davy!" he called.

The more he cried after me, the more beseechingly his voice rang in my
ears, the more my heart urged me to return--the harder I ran.

* * * * *

I wish I had not struck him ... I wish, I say, I had not struck him ...
I wish that when he came towards me, with his arms wide open, his
grave, gray eyes pleading--wretched soul that he was--I wish that then I
had let him enfold me. What poor cleverness, what a poor sacrifice, it
would have been! 'Twas I--strange it may have been--but still 'twas I,
Davy Roth, a child, Labrador born and bred, to whom he stretched out his
hand. I should have blessed God that to this remote place a needful man
had come. 'Twas my great moment of opportunity. I might--I might--have
helped him. How rare the chance! And to a child! I might have taken his
hand. I might have led him immediately into placid waters. But I was
I--unfeeling, like all lads: blind, too, reprehensible, deserving of
blame. In all my life--and, as it happens (of no merit of my own, but of
his), it has thus far been spent seeking to give help and comfort to
such as need it--never, never, in the diligent course of it, has an
opportunity so momentous occurred. I wish--oh, I wish--he might once
again need me! To lads--and to men--and to fr