'Something must assuredly happen to exonerate the guiltless, it would be profane to doubt,' said Dr. May continually to himself and to the Wards; but Leonard's secret was a painful burthen that he could scarcely have borne without sharing it with that daughter who was his other self, and well proved to be a safe repository.
'That's my Leonard,' said Ethel. 'I know him much better now than any time since the elf-bolt affair! They have not managed to ruin him among them.'
'What do you call this?' said Dr. May, understanding her, indeed, but willing to hear her thought expressed.
'Thankworthy,' she answered, with a twitching of the corners of her mouth.
'You will suffer for this exaltation,' he said, sadly; 'you know you have a tender heart, for all your flights.'
'And you know you have a soul as well as a heart,' said Ethel, as well as the swelling in her throat would allow.
'To be sure, this world would be a poor place to live in, if admiration did not make pity bearable,' said the Doctor; 'but--but don't ask me, Ethel: you have not had that fine fellow in his manly patience before your eyes. Talk of your knowing him! You knew a boy! I tell you, this has made him a man, and one of a thousand--so high-minded and so simple, so clearheaded and well-balanced, so entirely resigned and free from bitterness! What could he not be? It would be grievous to see him cut off by a direct dispensation--sickness, accident, battle; but for him to come to such an end, for the sake of a double murderer--Ethel--it would almost stagger one's faith!'
'Almost!' repeated Ethel, with the smile of a conqueror.
'I know, I know,' said the Doctor. 'If it be so, it will be right; one will try to believe it good for him. Nay, there's proof enough in what it has done for him already. If you could only see him!'
'I mean to see him, if it should go against him,' said Ethel, 'if you will let me. I would go to him as I would if he were in a decline, and with more reverence.'
'Don't talk of it,' cried her father. 'For truth's sake, for justice's sake, for the country's sake, I can not, will not, believe it will go wrong. There is a Providence, after all, Ethel!'
And the Doctor went away, afraid alike of hope and despondency, and Ethel thought of the bright young face, of De Wilton, of Job, and of the martyrs; and when she was not encouraging Aubrey, or soothing Averil, her heart would sink, and the tears that would not come would have been very comfortable.