walked up the aisle
to the table at which John stood. He turned his face to the
congregation, and, lifting up his big hand, cried out:

"Be quiet, John Penelles. I be to blame in this matter. I be the
villain! There isn't a Cornishman living that be such a Judas as I be.
'Twas under my old boat Denas Penelles found the love-letters that
couldn't have come to her own home. Why did I lend my boat and myself
for such a cruel bad end? Was it because I liked the young man? No, I
hated him. What for, then?" He put his hand in his pocket, took out a
piece of gold, and, in the sight of all, dashed it down on the table.

"That's what I did it for. One pound! A wisht beggarly bit of money!
Judas asked thirty pieces. I sold Paul Pyn for one piece, and it was
too much--too much for such a ghastly, mean old rascal. I be cruel
sorry--but there then! where be the good of 'sorry' now? That bit of
gold have burnt my soul blacker than a coal! dreadful! aw, dreadful! I
wouldn't touch it again to save my mean old life. And if there be a
man or a woman in Cornwall that will touch it, they be as uncommon bad
as I be! that is sure."

"Paul, I forgive you, and there is my hand upon it. A man can only be
'sorry.' 'Sorry' be all that God asks," said John Penelles in a low
voice.

"I be no man, John. I be just a cruel bad fellow. I never had a child
to love me or one to love. No woman would be my wife. I be kind of
forsaken--no kith or kin to care about me," and, with his brown,
rugged face cast down, he began to walk toward the door. Then Ann Bude
rose in the sight of all. She went to his side; she took his hand and
passed out of the chapel with him. And everyone looked at the other,
for Paul had loved Ann for twenty years and twenty times at least Ann
had refused to be his wife. But now, in this hour of his shame and
sorrow, she had gone to his side, and a sigh and a smile passed from
heart to heart and from face to face.

John stood still, with his eyes fixed on the piece of gold. It lay on
the table like a guilty thing. All Pyn's sin seemed to have passed
into it. Men and women stood up to look at it where it lay--the
wretched tool of a bad man. It was a relief when Jacob Trenager gave
out a hymn, a greater relief that John Penelles went out while they
were singing it. Brothers and sisters all wished to talk about John
and John's trouble, but to talk to him in his grief and humiliation
was a different thing. Only the old chapel-keeper