’The Stotts are in trouble, and they ask for my presence, Good-afternoon; I’m going.’

‘Howd on a bit,’ said Amos, still holding the minister by the lapel of his coat.  ‘Naa listen to me.  If I were yo’ I wouldn’t go.  Th’ lass hes made her bed; let her lie on’t.  Durnd yo’ risk yor repetation by makkin’ it yasier, or by takkin’ ony o’ th’ thorns aat o’ her pillow.  Rehoboth Church is praad o’ her sheep; and it keeps th’ black uns aatside th’ fold, and yo’ll nobbud ged blacked yorsel if yo’ meddle wi’ ’em.  But young colts ’ll goa their own gait, so pleeas yorsel.’

At first Mr. Penrose was inclined to think twice over the old Pharisee’s advice; but, looking round, he saw Mrs. Stott’s sad face in her cottage doorway, and her look determined his advance.  In a moment reputation and propriety were forgotten in what he felt were the claims of a mother’s heart and the sufferings of an erring soul.

‘Ay, Mr. Penrose, I’m some fain to see yo’,’ cried the poor woman, as the minister walked up the garden-path.  ’Amanda’s baan fast, and hoo sez ‘at it’s all dark.’  And then, seizing Mr. Penrose’s hand, she cried:  ‘Yo’ durnd think hoo’s damned, dun yo’?’

For years the sound of that mother’s voice as she uttered those words haunted Mr. Penrose.  He heard it in the stillness of the night, and in the quiet of his study; it came floating on the winds as he walked the fields and moors; and would sound in mockery as he, from time to time, declared a Father’s love from the old pulpit at Rehoboth.  What cruel creed was this, prompting a mother to believe that God would damn the child whom she herself was forced, out of the fulness of her undying love, to take back into her house and into her heart?

As the minister and Mrs. Stott sat down in the kitchen, the poor woman, in the depths of her despair, again raised her eager face and asked: 

‘But yo’ durnd think Amanda’s damned, dun yo’?’

‘No, I do not, Mrs. Stott.’

This was too much for the mother; and now that the highest passions in her soul received the affirmative of one whom she looked up to as the prophet of God, she felt her girl was safe.  The fire of despair died out of her eyes, quenched in the tears of joy, and she realized, as never before, that she could now love God because God had spared to her, and to Himself, her only child.

‘But, Mr. Penrose, Amanda says it’s all dark.  Dun yo’ think yo’ could lift th’ claads a bit?’

’Well, we’ll do our best; but to the One who loves her the darkness and the light are both alike.’

And with these words on his lips, he followed the mother to where the sick girl lay.