s child that by some strange or so the villagers thought she believed to resemble her drowned baby had earned the respect of more than one wife and mother though they wondered greatly that she should willingly leave the boy in whose very life she seemed bound up there were many prayers put up for in the village at this time the chief being that a might be born to her and so win mr for the first time to love a child of his own for the sake of its resemblance to its mother i think if td got a new born baby to lie in my arms said one day in late october when the were wondering what tide would bring to the red hall i could bear to let one of the other ones go couldn t you she added suddenly to bet of the mill story of a sin i don t know said you see we when they are coming and there s the pain but there ain t a true woman that hates the child for tliat � and somehow whether it s or or mat or bill they make their way to our hearts and we can t abide to lose em even if the burial club do pay up handsome and we ve got the satisfaction of knowing they re up top as where having no they can t feel hungry like as they do more or less below and what with washing days and a husband getting tight most saturday nights she added the en gets a poor time of it but there you ve got the mother s heart and you understand she added clutching s hand with her own weather beaten honest one early in november there was one day in the village a report of mrs s sudden and premature illness was one of the first to hear it and scarcely waiting to cloak herself made her way to the red hall and unobserved as she thought reached the nursery by the door that led from it to the garden it was about three o clock and in the clear air the house wore an unwonted look of cheerfulness and peace so that on looking at it one noticed less the frown thrown from the rock behind it than the red flung by the sun on its many windows and so giving warmth to the otherwise cold colouring oi tht story of a sin is she dead thought as she turned the handle and went in struck by the quiet that reigned in the as she went forward trembling and afraid she heard a step behind her and turning came face to face with mr who had seen her enter and followed she neither moved nor spoke but stood a image of detected guilt feeling that what she had her soul and her vow to to win had escaped her what is your errand here he said his old suspicions returning in full force as he marked each sign of guilty terror written on her face you were looking for my wife he said quietly a sudden gleam shot across her features � he had suggested to her an idea and she boldly seized upon it as a behind which to shelter her real intention why not she said sullenly she was kind to me i have a mind to see her � she wants to see me times and times i have got out of her way but now i would like to have a word with her before it is too late for she is ill they say and she might be beyond my reach to morrow she isn t dead she added struck by the curious change that had passed over mr s face dead he repeated the hatred of his glance the scorn of his voice keen as the of a knife to her heart and you living but you tempt fate he story of a sin added abruptly i gave you your warning once before i give it you now again make one more effort to see her and the consequences be on your own head you told me that before she said slowly and i might have listened to you then only got a taste of happiness and a soul that s faint with starving ii sometimes lay the bit of food down feeling that she s got beyond it and it s easier to die than to worry on but when you ve got to love your life and morning noon and night your heart cries out to be fed it isn t in human nature to go away to oblige somebody who s been cruel to you from the beginning and as was the woman s instinct of right even now it yet moved her towards the father of her dead child she could have forgiven him she thought if it had lived in his image representing the good he might have brought to her life and not the evil but and stern mr stood the judge not the in the sin and the moment of up in her breast as suddenly as it had been born you can be reached through her she said with one of those impulses of reckless that sometimes will sweep a good as well as a bad woman away if she came in here now this minute i d tell her before your eyes it would not take very long to say your husband is the father of my dead child lord told you a lie she came close to him possessed by a rage story of a sin tempted violence but mr returned her glance with a calmness that still further her perhaps you ll keep us apart after all she said but deeds can speak as well as words and when you see her heart wrung and her cheek white with misery 