city to comprehend the reasons for
Mr. Belcher's change of look and manner, and saw that her evening's
mission would prove fruitless; but her true woman's heart would not
permit her to relinquish her project.

"Is poor Benedict comfortable?" he inquired, in his old, off-hand way.

"Comfortable--yes, in the way that pigs are."

"Pigs are very comfortable, I believe, as a general thing," said Mr.
Belcher.

"Bob Belcher," said Miss Butterworth, the tears springing to her eyes in
spite of herself, and forgetting all the proprieties she had determined
to observe, "you are a brute. You know you are a brute. He is in a
little cell, no larger than--than--a pig-pen. There isn't a bit of
furniture in it. He sleeps on the straw, and in the straw, and under the
straw, and his victuals are poked at him as if he were a beast. He is a
poor, patient, emaciated wretch, and he sits on the floor all day, and
weaves the most beautiful things out of the straw he sits on, and Tom
Buffum's girls have got them in the house for ornaments. And he talks
about his rifle, and explains it, and explains it, and explains it, when
anybody will listen to him, and his clothes are all in rags, and that
little boy of his that they have in the house, and treat no better than
if he were a dog, knows he is there, and goes and looks at him, and
calls to him, and cries about him whenever he dares. And you sit here,
in your great house, with your carpets and chairs, that half smother
you, and your looking-glasses and your fine clothes, and don't start to
your feet when I tell you this. I tell you if God doesn't damn everybody
who is responsible for this wickedness, then there is no such thing as a
God."

Miss Butterworth was angry, and had grown more and more angry with every
word. She had brooded over the matter all the afternoon, and her pent-up
indignation had overflowed beyond control. She felt that she had spoken
truth which Robert Belcher ought to hear and to heed, yet she knew that
she had lost her hold upon him. Mr. Belcher listened with the greatest
coolness, while a half smile overspread his face.

"Don't you think I'm a pretty good-natured man to sit here," said he,
"and hear myself abused in this way, without getting angry?"

"No, I think you are a bad-natured man. I think you are the
hardest-hearted and worst man I ever saw. What in God's name has Paul
Benedict done, that he should be treated in this way? There are a dozen
there just like hi