Mr. Wentworth, who had been talking with Mrs. Jocelyn, observed nothing of all this, and took his leave with assurances that they would see him soon again.

Mildred stood irresolute, full of bitter self-reproach.  She took an impulsive step toward the door to call Roger back, but, checking herself, said despairingly, “I can deceive neither him nor myself.  Oh, mamma, it is of no use.”  And indeed she felt that it would be impossible to carry out the scheme that promised so much for those she loved.  As the lightning flash eclipses the sun at noonday, so all of her gratitude and self-sacrificial enthusiasm now seemed but pale sickly sentiment before that vivid flame of honest love—­that divine fire which consumes at touch every motive save the one for the sacred union of two lives.

“I wish I could see such a man as Roger Atwood look at me as he looked at you,” said Belle indignantly.  “I would not send him away with a heartache.”

“Would to Heaven it had been you, Belle!” replied Mildred dejectedly.  “I can’t help it—­I’m made so, and none will know it better than he.”

“Don’t feel that way,” remonstrated Mrs. Jocelyn; “time and the thought of what Roger can do for us will work great changes.  You have years before you.  If he will help us save your father—­”

“Oh, mamma, I could shed for him all the blood left in my body.”

“Nonsense!” cried the matter-of-fact Belle.  “He doesn’t want your blood; he only wants a sensible girl who will love him as he deserves, and who will help him to help us all.”

Mildred made a despairing gesture and went to her room.  She soon reappeared with a quilt and a pillow, and placing them on the floor beside the low bed in which the children slept, said, “I’ll stay here, and you take my place with Belle, mamma.  No,” she added resolutely, as her mother began to remonstrate; “what I resolve upon I intend to do hereafter, even to the least thing.  You shall not go near the room where papa is to-night.”

Throughout the evening, while love, duty, and generous sympathy planned for his redemption; throughout the long night, while the sad-hearted wife prayed for success in their efforts, the husband and father lay shrouded in the heavy, rayless darkness of a drunken stupor.

CHAPTER XXXVII

STRONG TEMPTATION

Well, I must admit that I have rarely been so touched and interested before,” said Mr. Wentworth, as he and Roger walked homeward together; “and that is saying much, for my calling brings human life before me in almost every aspect.  Mildred Jocelyn is an unusual girl.  Until to-day I thought her a trifle cold, and even incapable of very deep feeling.  I thought pride—­not a common pride, you know, but the traditional and proverbial pride of a Southern woman—­her chief characteristic, but the girl was fairly volcanic with feeling to-night.  I believe she would starve in very truth to save her