O. Henry's Tussle with the Devil?

The beloved dead step nearer when their bodies drop aside. They know where they are and what they are doing. It is not for us to worry in that way. 

And they are out of hours and minutes.

While the stories necessarily reflect in their style the high aspiration that prompted them, they prove, as O. Henry's Ghost so vividly remarked, that a leopard can change its spots.