“Half a dozen times I have nearly sent for you.  But”—­she did not shudder now, or make the restless movements he had noticed when he first came in:  Molly had regained the stillness which follows after storms—­“as soon as you are gone I shall be longing to have it back again.  Men have done worse things than I have for thirty thousand a year!  It won’t be easy to be a pauper; I think it would be easier to kill myself.”

She was silent again, and Mark could not find one word that he was not afraid to say—­one word that might not quench the smoking flax.

“I had to give it to you without waiting to talk of the future, or I might not have given it at all.  But I should be glad if the case could be so arranged that my mother’s name and my own should not be dragged in the mud.  It is only an appeal for mercy—­nothing else.”  Her voice trembled almost into silence.

“I think that is all safe,” said Mark.  “I think if you will leave it all in my hands I can get better conditions for you than you suppose now.  They will be only too glad.”

“But I gave it to you without conditions.”  Her manner for the moment was that of a child seeking reassurance.

“Thank God! you did,” he cried, with an irrepressible burst of sympathy.

“It’s not much for a thief to have done, is it?  But now I should like to do it all properly.  Tell me; ought I to come away from here to-day, and give everything I have here to Lady Rose?  If I ought, I will!”

“No, certainly not,” said Mark.  “I have been asked to offer you liberal conditions if you would agree to a compromise.  I said they had come to quite the wrong person.  No, no, don’t think I told them.  They have fresh evidence that there was a will, and they believe they know that important papers were brought to you by Dr. Larrone when your mother died.”

“And you came to frighten me with this?” There was a touch of reproach in her tone.

“No, I came, hoping you would give me the paper, as you have done, without knowing this.”

Evidently this news impressed Molly deeply, but she did not want to discuss it.  Presently she said: 

“I am glad you came in time before I was frightened.  How you have wanted to make me save my soul!  You have helped me very much, but I cannot save my soul.”

“But God can,” said Mark.

“You see,” she went on, “I never know what I am going to do—­going to be—­next.  Imagine my being a thief!  It seems now almost incredible.  And I don’t know what may come next.”

For a second she looked at him with wild terror in her eyes.

“Think how many years I have before me.  How can I hope that I——?”

“You will do great, great good,” said Mark, with emotion.

She shook her head.

“David committed a worse sin than yours.”

Molly smiled, a little, incredulous, grey smile, for a moment.

“I may be good to-day.  I may be full of peace and joy even to-night—­but to-morrow?  You told me once that I should only know true joy if I had been humbled in the dust.  I am low enough now, but the comfort has not come yet, and, even if God comforts me, it won’t last.  I shall still be I, and life is so long.”