a slight movement throughout the congregation.  Some glanced to where would have sat Mr. Marmaduke Haward, had not the gentleman been at present in his bed, raving now of a great run of luck at the Cocoa Tree; now of an Indian who, with his knee upon his breast, was throttling him to death.  Others looked over their shoulders to see if that gypsy yet sat beneath the gallery.  Colonel Byrd took out his snuffbox and studied the picture on the lid, while his daughter sat like a carven lady, with a slight smile upon her lips.

On went the word picture that showed how vice could flaunt it in so fallen an age.  The preacher spared not plain words, squarely turned himself toward the gallery, pointed out with voice and hand the object of his censure and of God’s wrath.  Had the law pilloried the girl before them all, it had been but little worse for her.  She sat like a statue, staring with wide eyes at the window above the altar.  This, then, was what the words in the coach last night had meant—­this was what the princess thought—­this was what his world thought—­

There arose a commotion in the ranks of the clergy of Virginia.  The Reverend Gideon Darden, quitting with an oath the company of his brethren, came down the aisle, and, pushing past his wife, took his stand in the pew beside the orphan who had lived beneath his roof, whom during many years he had cursed upon occasion and sometimes struck, and whom he had latterly made his tool, “Never mind him, Audrey, my girl,” he said, and put an unsteady hand upon her shoulder.  “You’re a good child; they cannot harm ye.”

He turned his great shambling body and heavy face toward the preacher, stemmed in the full tide of his eloquence by this unseemly interruption, “Ye beggarly Scot!” he exclaimed thickly.  “Ye evil-thinking saint from Salem way, that know the very lining of the Lord’s mind, and yet, walking through his earth, see but a poisonous weed in his every harmless flower!  Shame on you to beat down the flower that never did you harm!  The girl’s as innocent a thing as lives!  Ay, I’ve had my dram,—­the more shame to you that are justly rebuked out of the mouth of a drunken man!  I have done, Mr. Commissary,” addressing himself to that dignitary, who had advanced to the altar rail with his arm raised in a command for silence.  “I’ve no child of my own, thank God! but the maid has grown up in my house, and I’ll not sit to hear her belied.  I’ve heard of last night; ’twas the mad whim of a sick man.  The girl’s as guiltless of wrong as any lady here.  I, Gideon Darden, vouch for it!”

He sat heavily down beside Audrey, who never stirred from her still regard of that high window.  There was a moment of portentous silence; then, “Let us pray,” said the minister from the pulpit.