--so far as external things went, visible and
palpable pains and penalties. She had not paid full toll. Luck had been
with her and had afforded her a case--not a good one, but good enough to
give her courage a handle. Her other advantages--her attractiveness, her
position, her wealth, she had used with dexterity and without scruple to
protect her from punishment. She had cajoled and she had bribed--both
successfully; only the irreconcilables remained unreconciled. To no
small extent she had jockeyed outraged morality--in externals. Many
people did it even more successfully--by not being even half found out,
and therefore not put on their defense at all. But for one who had been
at least half found out, against whom circumstantial evidence was
terribly strong although direct proof might be lacking, she had come off
very cheaply. Nobody about her told her so; we spoiled her. She was
afraid that Alison, in manner, very likely even in words, would tell her
now, face to face. Being taken to task was terribly against the grain
with her. Only Jenny might punish Jenny--and the blows must fall in
secret.

Alison came to my house first a quarter of an hour before the time of
his appointment with Jenny. He was grave and silent; in the spirit,
though naturally not in the flesh, he wore full canonicals; the
consciousness of his office was about him. I had grown--and I may as
well confess it--into an intellectual hostility to all this, a
skepticism which prompted rebellion. But he was doing what he disliked
very much in obedience to his view of duty. It is churlish to show
disrespect to a man acting in that way, simply because one may consider
his view incorrect or exaggerated. I had once charged him with wanting
to burn people; let me not fall into the temptation of wanting to burn
him--or where stood my boasted liberality of thought?

"I'm not sorry that you're to be with us, Austin," he said, as we walked
up to the Priory. "Interfere if I show any signs of growing hot."

"If she tells you the truth, you won't grow hot. But if you grow hot,
she won't tell you the truth," I answered.

"I don't go in my own strength," he reminded me with gentle gravity.

On the terrace, by the door, Margaret lay on a long wicker chair. She
sprang up when we came near, blushing in her artless fashion at the
encounter. Alison's stern-set face flashed out into a tender delighted
smile. "God bless the pretty child!" he murmured as he went forward and