The Way of All Flesh
His mother was crying, but she sprang forward to meet him and clasped him in her arms. "Oh, my boy, my boy," she sobbed, and she could say no more.
Ernest was as white as a sheet. His heart beat so that he could hardly breathe. He let his mother embrace him, and then withdrawing himself stood silently before her with the tears falling from his eyes.
At first he could not speak. For a minute or so the silence on all sides was complete. Then, gathering strength, he said in a low voice:
"Mother," (it was the first time he had called her anything but "mamma"?) "we must part." On this, turning to the warder, he said: "I believe I am free to leave the prison if I wish to do so. You cannot compel me to remain here longer. Please take me to the gates."
Theobald stepped forward. "Ernest, you must not, shall not, leave us in this way."
"Do not speak to me," said Ernest, his eyes flashing with a fire that was unwonted in them. Another warder then came up and took Theobald aside, while the first conducted Ernest to the gates.
"Tell them," said Ernest, "from me that they must think of me as one dead, for I am dead to them. Say that my greatest pain is the thought of the disgrace I have inflicted upon them, and that above all things else I will study to avoid paining them hereafter; but say also that if they write to me I will return their letters unopened, and that if they come and see me I will protect myself in whatever way I can."
By this time he was at the prison gate, and in another moment was at liberty. After he had got a few steps out he turned his face to the prison wall, leant against it for support, and wept as though his heart would break.
Giving up father and mother for Christ's sake was not such an easy matter after all. If a man has been possessed by devils for long enough they will rend him as they leave him, however imperatively they may have been cast out. Ernest did not stay long where he was, for he feared each moment
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