Rix Parkinson had been a handsome man, but now disease and the shadow of death were upon his countenance; he had long sunk into a chronic crapulence, and only his eyes, that shone from a wasted and besotted face, retained some natural beauty. He was dying, but vitality still flashed up in him, and no physician could with certainty predict whether a week or a month might remain to him. Parkinson’s home adjoined that wherein young Samuel Prowse lived with his mother; and this woman it was who of her charity ministered to the sufferer, and carried out the doctor’s orders.

“Blood is thicker than water,” said a neighbour. “Why for don’t the man’s relations come to him?”

But Mrs Prowse shook her head. “An’ Christianity’s thicker than blood,” she answered. “As for the poor soul’s relations—why ’tis surely given to the Christian to scrape kinship with all the sick an’ the sorrowing? ’Tis our glory and our duty to do it.”

This good woman knew Minnie Sweetland well, and had known her since her childhood. Now she opened the door of Parkinson’s cottage to the widow and Titus Sim.

“He’m ready and waiting,” said Mrs Prowse. “He’ve just awoke from a long sleep, an’ be strong as a lion for the minute, and out of pain seemingly. Come in an’ let him say what he will to you while strength’s with him.”

They followed her into the sick room, where Rix Parkinson sat up in bed with a blue shawl wrapped round him. At his elbow was a table with bottles and a Bible upon it.

“You be come? Well, I’m glad of it. I won’t waste words, for my wind grows scanty. Sit here, young woman, please; an’ you leave us, mother. But don’t go far. I don’t like to see you out of my eyes so long as they be open.”

Mrs Prowse smiled at him and departed. Sim sat on one side of the sick man and Minnie took her place upon the other.

For a moment he was silent, breathing slowly and looking up at the ceiling. Then he spoke.

“They’ve given me the credit for a lot of night work in the free trade way with hares and pheasants as I didn’t do; but, against that, nobody’s never blamed me for a lot of things as I did do. For instance, the business of Adam Thorpe—there was only one name ever cropped up in that—your husband’s. I seed him took away after you was married; and I laughed and said in the open street, ‘Lucky’s the he that gets that she!’ Meaning you, young woman. But God’s my judge, if it had gone further I should have told what I know about it. ’Tis only them as be careful of their skins that come to harm in the world. If you don’t care a curse what happens to you, the devil makes you his own care. Two men was in the row when Adam Thorpe got his last dose, and I was one of ’em. T’other be going strong still, but he don’t come into this story; and his name ban’t Daniel Sweetland; an’ it wasn’t him as shot Adam Thorpe. I done it. I didn’t go out to do it; but ’twas him or me as it chanced. I had to stop him, or he’d have stopped me. He bested me once afore—long ago—an’ I wasn’t going to let him do it again. So I shot him and fired low, hoping to stop him without killing him. But his time had come. So much for that. I went my way and made little doubt but the police would smell out the truth, for I’d done nought to hide it. But I heard nothing until next morning. Then there comed the news that Thorpe was dead, and that Dan Sweetland’s new gun had been found alongside the place where he was shot. That interested me, and I began to wonder what my pal had been up to. There was no chance to ax him just then. ’Twas his affair, anyway, not mine. And then I began to take a new interest in my life and find out what a damned fine thing it was to be alive and free. They nabbed Sweetland and I watched ’em do it. If it had come to hanging, I’d have given myself up for him; but instead of that, he gived ’em the slip. And the rest you know. Now he’s dead, they tell me, and, as I shall be after him afore the corn’s ripe, I want to clear his memory for evermore. He had no hand in that job, and, so far as I know, wasn’t within miles of the place. The matter of the gun be on my pal’s shoulders. He denied it when I taxed him. But right well I know that he put it there for his own ends. I’ll say no more about that. But God in Heaven can witness that I’d never have let ’em hang Daniel. My pal and me had one or two other little affairs afterwards, as we’d had many before; then my health gived way, an’ now I’m rotting alive and sha’n’t be sorry to go. Ax any questions you like. Mr Sim here will testify to what I’ve told you. I’ll swear afore my Judge that every word be true. As to Thorpe, I didn’t go that night to kill him; but if there was a man I should have liked to settle with, ’twas him. I slept no worse for it. If your husband had lived an’ got penal servitude, ’twas my intention to tell you the truth on my deathbed, as I have now; but not otherwise—unless they’d given him the rope. Then I’d have confessed an’ took it. That’s the living truth. He’s died afore me, after all; but now that you know how ’twas, his memory’s clear, and you can tell the world all about it so soon as I be gone.”

There was a silence; then Parkinson spoke again.

“I’m not hopeful to see Dan upalong; for ’twould be awful ’dashus for the like of me wi’ my sporting career, to count on Heaven; but I’ve done what I can to atone. Any way, if I do come up with Daniel Sweetland—whether ’tis the good place or the bad—this I’ll tell him: that his memory be clear an’ that ’tis known to Moreton he was guiltless. ’Twill be a comfort to the man, I should think—wherever he bides.”

A wonderful look rested on the face of Minnie Sweetland. For a moment pure thankfulness filled her soul; then there came gratitude into it. To dwell upon the past was vain; to ask this perishing wretch why he had kept silence when her husband was taken from her; to wring her hands or weep for the woful past—these things at any time were deeds foreign to the woman’s nature. Her mind was practical. It had in it now no room for more than thankfulness and gratitude. She uttered a wordless and silent prayer—a thanksgiving that flashed through her heart in a throb; then she turned to the penitent and took his hand between hers.

“May a merciful Lord be good to you for this,” she said gently. “May you rest easier and die easier for knowing that you’ve righted my innocent husband’s memory and lifted darkness from the heads of his father and his mother. And mine—mine! You told me nought I didn’t know in my heart, for from his own lips ’twas spoken to me that he’d not done it or dreamed of it; but now the world can know. Nought will be hidden any more. All living men, as have ever heard my Daniel’s name, shall hear ’tis an honourable name—a name that I’ll go down to my grave proud of. ’Twill make my life easier to live—easier to bear; ’twill sweeten it till my own short years be run an’ I go back to him for ever.”

Titus Sim listened and said nothing; but he felt the scene sharply. His brows were down-drawn and her words made him suffer.

At last, with an effort, he spoke to Parkinson.

“We must leave you now. Your strength has been taxed enough. This is a good day for all of us—a day to make man trust surer in his God and in the power of right. Say no more of this to any soul, Rix Parkinson. You’ve done your duty, and ’twill weigh for you in Heaven and lift you up at the end.”

“You’ll let me die in peace?” asked the sick man. But he spoke to Minnie: from the first moment of their entry he turned to her, and only her.

“Be sure of that. What avails to trouble your last hours now? Nothing shall be said till you’re asleep.”

“Don’t be gentle to me—ban’t in human nature. I don’t ax that. I don’t ax you to forgive or to forget what an everlasting rascal I’ve been.”

“I do forgive you,” she said.

“Why, then Dan will; an’ God will! Be He behind His own men and women in love an’ kindness? Now I can die laughing. To think ’twas in human power of a wife to forgive me!”

“Come,” said Sim. “We will leave him now.”

Titus rose and turned to get his hat. He was only removed from them a moment, but in that space the sufferer beckoned Minnie with his eyes and she leant her head towards him.

“Don’t marry that man!” he whispered under his breath; then continued aloud, to mask his message, “Good-bye—say, ‘good-bye’ to a sinner, who yet can go fearless now—ay, an’ thankful too. Fearless an’ thankful, because you could forgive him. ’Tis your goodness, widow Sweetland, that has lifted me to trust the goodness of God; ’tis your pardon hath made me trust in His. I’ll go to my punishment without flinching or fearing, for I know He’ll forgive me at the end.”

Mrs Prowse entered with food for the sick man, and Minnie and Sim took their eternal leave of him.

Within half an hour Parkinson was again sleeping peacefully, and while Titus ran home without stopping, for he was late, Minnie walked slowly to the Moor. Her sad face shone with this blessed news. She longed to cry from the housetops; she thirsted to tell each passer-by that her husband was innocent of the evil linked with his name. She thought of his mother first and then his father; she even felt more tenderly towards Titus Sim for the deep joy he had expressed on hearing the truth; but presently the living faded from her memory and she was in thought alone with her husband. At Bennett’s Cross, hard by Warren Inn, an impulse moved her from the lonely road to the lonely stone. And she passed over the heath and knelt by the ancient granite carved into the symbol of her faith. She knelt and prayed and so passed on, much uplifted by the blessing of the day. She moved forward thankful, grateful for this unutterable good, strong to endure her life without him, fortified to face an existence which, like the faded yet lovely passage of an Indian Summer, should not lack for some subdued goodness, should not be void of beauty and content. The power to do good remained with her; she repined no more; her native bravery rose in her heart. She looked out fearless and patient upon the loneliness to come, and in that survey she intended that a memory would be her beacon, not a man. The dying drunkard need have felt no fear for Daniel’s widow. It was not in her nature to marry again.