gment.

'How did you learn my secret, Graham?' he asked, after a pause.

'Indirectly from Gabriel.'

'Gabriel,' said the bishop, trembling, 'is at Nauheim!'

'You are mistaken, Pendle. He returned to Beorminster this morning, and
as he was afraid to speak to you on the subject of Jentham, he came to
ask my advice. The poor lad is broken down and ill, and is now lying in
my consulting-room until I return.'

'How did Gabriel learn the truth?' asked Pendle, with a look of pain.

'From something his mother said.'

The bishop, in spite of his enforced calmness, groaned aloud. 'Does she
know of it?' he murmured, while drops of perspiration beaded his
forehead and betrayed his inward agony. 'Could not that shame be spared
me?' 'Do not be hasty, Pendle, your wife knows nothing.'

'Thank God!' said the bishop, fervently; then added, almost immediately,
'You say my wife. Alas! alas! that I dare not call her so.'

'It is true, then?' asked Graham, becoming very pale.

'Perfectly true. Krant was not killed. Krant returned here under the
name of Jentham. My wife is not my wife! My children are illegitimate;
they have no name; outcasts they are. Oh, the shame! Oh, the disgrace!'
and Dr Pendle groaned aloud.

Graham sympathised with the man's distress, which was surely natural
under the terrible calamity which had befallen him and his. George
Pendle was a priest, a prelate, but he was also a son of Adam, and
liable, like all mortals, the strongest as the weakest, to moments of
doubt, of fear, of trembling, of utter dismay. Had the evil come upon
him alone, he might have borne it with more patience, but when it parted
him from his dearly-loved wife, when it made outcasts of the children he
was so proud of, who can wonder that he should feel inclined to cry with
Job, 'Is it good unto Thee that Thou should'st oppress!' Nevertheless,
like Job, the bishop held fast his integrity.

Yet that he might have some comfort in his affliction, that one pang
might be spared to him, Graham assured him that Mrs Pendle was ignorant
of the truth, and related in full the story of how Gabriel had come to
connect Jentham with Krant. Pendle listened in silence, and inwardly
thanked God that at least so much mercy had been vouchsafed him. Then in
his turn he made a confidant of his old friend, recalled the early days
of his courtship and marriage, spoke of the long interval of peace and
quiet happiness which he and his wife had enjoyed, and ende