upon Madison it fell potent, masterful, and passion fled, and in its
place came a strange, groping response within him, a revulsion, a
penitence--and he bowed his head.

And then Helena spoke--but her head was turned away from him, hidden on
the Patriarch's breast.

"Once," she said, and her words were like broken whispers, for she was
sobbing still, "once, long, long ago, when I was a little girl, I read
the story of Mary Magdalen. I had almost forgotten it, it was so long
ago, but it has come back to me, and--and it is a glad story--at the
end."

She stopped--and Madison raised his head, and his face was strained as
with some sudden wonder as he looked at her.

"It is a glad story," she said presently. "It--it is my story."

"You mean"--Madison's voice was hoarse--"you mean that you've
turned--_straight_!"

"They love me here," she said. "They trust me and they think me good--as
they are. All think me that--the little children and this dear man
here--and for a little while, since I have been here, I have lived like
that. They made me believe that it was true--_true_. And there was shame
and agony--and hope. It seemed they could not all be wrong, and I have
asked and prayed that I might make it true always--and--and forgiveness
for what I was."

"You mean," he said again hoarsely, and he stepped toward her now, "you