utterance.

An indescribable thrill of conscious delight shot through the frame of
Stephen as the woman spoke the words. But the gentleman in him
triumphed. I would have said _the Christian_, for whatever there was
in Stephen of the _gentle_ was there in virtue of the _Christian_,
only he failed in one point: instead of saying at once, that he had no
intention of prosecuting the boy, he pretended, I believe from the
satanic delight in power that possesses every man of us, that he would
turn it over in his mind. It might have been more dangerous, but it
would have been more divine, if he had lifted the kneeling woman to
his heart, and told her that not for the wealth of an imagination
would he proceed against her brother. The divinity, however, was
taking its course, both rough-hewing and shaping the ends of the two.

She rose from the ground, sat on the one chair, with her face to the
wall, and wept, helplessly, with the added sting, perhaps, of a faint
personal disappointment. Stephen failed to attract her notice, and
left the room. She started up when she heard the door close, and flew
to open it, but was only in time to hear the outer door. She sat down
and cried again.

Stephen had gone to find the boy if he might, and bring him to his
sister. He ought to have said so, for to permit suffering for the sake
of a joyful surprise is not good. Going home first, he was hardly
seated in his room, to turn over not the matter but the means, when a
knock came to the shop-door, the sole entrance, and there were two
policemen bringing the deserter in a cab. He had been run over in the
very act of decamping with the contents of the till, had lain all but
insensible at the hospital while his broken leg was being set, but, as