CHAPTER XXIV

It was Sunday afternoon, nearly a week later. Elsie sat alone by the
window with a writing-tablet in her lap, gazing out at the row of
houses across the street. But though the new-fallen snow on roof,
cornice, and iron grating transformed the familiar scene, and though
snow in such profusion and splendor was a new and wonderful experience
to her, the girl wasn't really seeing the landscape any more than she
was writing a letter. Realizing the fact after half an hour of stony
silence, she rose, dropped her writing materials, and crossing the
room, threw herself down on the hearth-rug with a gesture of despair.

It wasn't merely because she couldn't write the letter--which, by the
way, was that which she had given as an excuse for withdrawing on the
evening of Mr. Graham's call. It was true that writing to her
stepmother--something that had been growing increasingly difficult for
some time--had become practically impossible since that evening. But
that was, in a way, a minor detail. For everything, _everything_ had
become impossible since the hour she had heard his recital of that
experience of Cousin Julia's youth.

"There's no use," the girl cried out within herself, "I simply cannot
stand it. I can't go on so. Cousin Julia's gone to a funeral. I'll
have one while she's gone and bury everything deep down. There's
nothing else to do. Now that I know for deadly certain that Cousin
Julia would hate me if she knew, I can't go on being--as I am. Why,
what _he_ did wasn't dishonest. It was only, as Mr. Graham said, less
than honest. And look at me!"

It was true that Cousin Julia hadn't _hated_ him, even when he wasn't
sorry about the wrong itself, Elsie repeated; for this was by no means
the first or second time she had gone over the matter since that night;
indeed, she had scarcely thought of anything else since. Still, she
wouldn't have anything more to do with him, and must have despised him,
which was worse. And it was also true that she would even have
forgiven him utterly if he had sinned in a moment of temptation. And
again the girl lamented bitterly that she hadn't done something even
worse if it could have been committed in hot blood, and therefore
followed by repentance, confession, and forgiveness. Only last evening
Cousin Julia had read some verses from Browning which had filled her
heart with a longing that was like remorse--something about a "certain
moment" which "c