be, though long may it be first!--I think I shall be a Roman
Catholic too; for it doesn't seem to me to matter much one way or
the other, and it would please William very much, and I am sure it
wouldn't hurt me. And what's the good of being married to the best
man in the world if you can't do a little thing like that to please
him?






A DEATH-BED CONFESSION





AND so you think I shall go to heaven when I die, sir! And why?
Because I have spent my time and what bits of money I've had in
looking after the poor in this parish! And I would do it again if I
had my time to come over again; but it will take more than that to
wipe out my sins, and God forgive me if I can't always believe that
even His mercy will be equal to it. You're a clergyman, and you
ought to know. I think sometimes the black heart in me, that started
me on that deed, must have come from the devil, and that I am his
child after all, and shall go back to him at the last. Don't look so
shocked, sir. That's not what I really believe; it's only what I
sometimes fear I ought to believe, when I wake up in the chill night
and think things over, lying here alone.