“Now, my boy,” said my father, “tell Mrs. Gregson why you have come here to-night.”
I had to use a dreadful effort to make myself speak. It was like resisting a dumb spirit and forcing the words from my lips. But I did not hesitate a moment. In fact, I dared not hesitate, for I felt that hesitation would be defeat.
“No no, my man,” said my father; “you must speak to Mrs. Gregson, not to me.”
Thereupon I had to make a fresh effort. When at this day I see a child who will not say the words required of him, I feel again just as I felt then, and think how difficult it is for him to do what he is told; but oh, how I wish he would do it, that he might be a conqueror I for I know that if he will not make the effort, it will grow more and more difficult for him to make any effort. I cannot be too thankful that I was able to overcome now.
“I came, Mrs. Gregson,” I faltered, “to tell you that I am very sorry I behaved so ill to you.”
“Yes, indeed,” she returned. “How would you like anyone to come and serve you so in your grand house? But a poor lone widow woman like me is nothing to be thought of. Oh no! not at all.”
“I am ashamed of myself,” I said, almost forcing my confession upon her.
“So you ought to be all the days of your life. You deserve to be drummed out of the town for a minister’s son that you are! Hoo!”
“You’d better not, or you shall hear of it, if there’s a sheriff in the county. To insult honest people after that fashion!”
I drew back, more than ever conscious of the wrong I had done in rousing such unforgiving fierceness in the heart of a woman. My father spoke now.
“Shall I tell you, Mrs. Gregson, what made the boy sorry, and made him willing to come and tell you all about it?”
“Oh, I’ve got friends after all. The young prodigal!”
“You are coming pretty near it, Mrs. Gregson,” said my father; “but you haven’t touched it quite. It was a friend of yours that spoke to my boy and made him very unhappy about what he had done, telling him over and over again what a shame it was, and how wicked of him. Do you know what friend it was?”
“Perhaps I do, and perhaps I don’t. I can guess.”
“I fear you don’t guess quite correctly. It was the best friend you ever had or ever will have. It was God himself talking in my poor boy’s heart. He would not heed what he said all day, but in the evening we were reading how the prodigal son went back to his father, and how the father forgave him; and he couldn’t stand it any longer, and came and told me all about it.”
