George remained at home with his only child, or was
at his mother's, or, shocking to relate, was in the fields, but not
at chapel; nor were any of his family there. During the whole of
these three months one image was for ever before his eyes. What
self-accusations! Of what injustice had he not been guilty? Little
things, at the time unnoticed, turns of her head, smiles, the fall of
her hair--oh, that sweet sweet brown hair!--all came back to him, and
were as real before him as the garden wall. He thought of her lying
in her grave--she whom he had caressed--of what was going on down
there, under the turf, and he feared he should go mad. Where was
she? Gone, for ever gone--gone before he had been able to make her
understand how much he really loved her, and so send her to sleep in
peace. But was she not in heaven? Would he not see her again? He
did not know. Strange to say, but true, he, a member of Tanner's
Lane Church, who had never read a sceptical book in his life, was
obliged to confess, perhaps not consciously, but none the less
actually, he did not know.
In those dark three months the gospel according to Tanner's Lane did
nothing for him, and he was cast forth to wrestle with his sufferings
alone.
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