raising his hand to shade fast-filling eyes, or to brush away the
tears that fell down his furrowed face. They told him of Amanda's
silence as to the past, and he commended her for it, remarking to
Mr. Penrose that the true penitent seldom talked of the yesterdays
of sin; they told him how she counted herself unworthy of home and
of love, seeking blame and not welcome from the mother to whom she
had returned, and he declared it to be a token of her call; they
told him of the great light and peace that fell on her as she
rested on the goodness of God, and they heard from him the echo of
his Master's words over Mary--'She hath loved much, for she hath
had much forgiven'; and then they told him of her desire for the
restoration of her name on the Rehoboth register, and he was
silent--and for some minutes no sound disturbed his reverie.

That silence was God's speaking hour. Within the old pastor's soul
a voice was whispering before which the thunderings of the creed
of a sect were hushed. He, poor man, knew full well that it was a
voice which had long striven to make itself heard--a still, small
voice that would neither strive nor cry--a haunting voice, a voice
constant in its companionship during his later years. How often he
would fain have listened to it! But he dared not, for was it not a
contradictory voice? Did it not traverse the letter which he had
sworn to uphold and declare? What if the voice were the voice of
God? No! It could not be. God spoke in His Book. It was plain.
Wayfaring men might read, and fools had no need to err. But was
God's voice for ever hushed? Had He had no message since the seal
was fixed to the Canon of Scripture? What if that which he heard
was one of those messages concerning which Christ said, 'I have
many things to say unto you, but ye cannot bear them now.' Had the
_now_ in his life passed? Had the _then_ come when a fuller