her
different; and you must not quarrel. I won't have that. Now, Eustace,
you are our son, and you have got to be kind and considerate. Sit down,
and let's talk it over."

And motioning her husband to a chair, she sat down in the embrasure of a
window. Miltoun remained standing. Visited by a sudden dread, Lady
Valleys said:

"Is it--you've not--there isn't going to be a scandal?"

Miltoun smiled grimly.

"I shall tell this man, of course, but you may make your minds easy, I
imagine; I understand that his view of marriage does not permit of
divorce in any case whatever."

Lady Valleys sighed with an utter and undisguised relief.

"Well, then, my dear boy," she began, "even if you do feel you must tell
him, there is surely no reason why it should not otherwise be kept
secret."

Lord Valleys interrupted her:

"I should be glad if you would point out the connection between your
honour and the resignation of your seat," he said stiffly.

Miltoun shook his head.

"If you don't see already, it would be useless."

"I do not see. The whole matter is--is unfortunate, but to give up your
work, so long as there is no absolute necessity, seems to me far-fetched
and absurd. How many men are, there into whose lives there has not
entered some such relation at one time or another? This idea would
disqualify half the nation." His eyes seemed in that crisis both to
consult and to avoid his wife's, as though he were at once asking her
endorsement of his point of view, and observing the proprieties. And for
a moment in the midst of her anxiety, her sense of humour got the better
of Lady Valleys. It was so funny that Geoff should have to give himself
away; she could not for the life of her help fixing him with her eyes.

"My dear," she murmured, "you underestimate three-quarters, at the very
least!"

But Lord Valleys, confronted with danger, was growing steadier.

"It passes my comprehension;" he said, "why you should want to mix up sex
and politics at all."

Miltoun's answer came very slowly, as if the confession were hurting his
lips:

"There is--forgive me for using the word--such a thing as one's religion.
I don't happen to regard life as divided into public and private
departments. My vision is gone--broken--I can see no object before me
now in public life--no goal--no certainty."

Lady Valleys caught his hand:

"Oh! my dear," she said, "that's too dreadfully puritanical!" But at
Miltoun's queer smil