When his pride lifted up its head, when he desired any satisfaction for himself, when he was tempted for a moment to lay down his cross, the cries came back, the sea of blood surged before him, and close behind came the shapes that crawled or moved furtively, ever about to spring in front and turn upon him.

Small wonder, then, that his shoulders bent beneath unseen burdens, that his air was of one who suffered for all the world, and that they called him "the little man of sorrows." With this knowledge he learned to permit himself only one great love, a love for the child Prudence.

He was sure that no punishment could come through that.

It was his day-star and his life, the one pleasure that brought no suffering with it.

She was a child of fourteen now, a half-wild, firm-fleshed, glowing creature of the out-of-doors, who had lost with her baby softness all her resemblance to her mother.