ing
than I should have expected. Surely her behaviour is very admirable.'

'Oh, I am not unjust in that sense. I have never refused to believe in
his innocence technically.'

'Excuse me, that has nothing to do with the matter. All we have to look
at is this. She is herself convinced of his innocence, and therefore
makes it her supreme duty to defend his memory. It appears to me that
she acts altogether nobly. In spite of all the evidence that was brought
on his side, the dastardly spirit of politics has persisted in making
Mutimer a sort of historical character, a type of the hypocritical
demagogue, to be cited whenever occasion offers. Would it be possible to
attach a more evil significance to a man's name than that which Mutimer
bears, and will continue to bear, among certain sections of writing
and speechifying vermin? It is a miserable destiny. If every man
who achieves notoriety paid for his faults in this way, what sort of
reputations would history consist of? I won't say that it isn't a good
thing, speaking generally, but in the individual case it is terribly
hard. Would you have his widow keep silence? That would be the easier
thing to do, be sure of it--for _her_, a thousand times the easier. I
regard her as the one entirely noble woman it has been my lot to
know. And if you thought calmly you could not speak of her with such
impatience.'

Hubert kept silence for a moment.

'It is all true. Of course it only means that I am savagely jealous. But
I cannot--upon my life I cannot--understand her having given her love to
such a man as that!'

Mr. Wyvern seemed to regard the landscape. There was a sad smile on his
countenance.

'Let there be an end of it,' Hubert resumed. 'I didn't mean to say
anything to you about the letter. Now, we'll talk of other things. Well,
I am going to have a summer among the German galleries; perhaps I shall
find peace there. You have let your son know that I am coming?'

The vicar nodded. They continued their walk along the top of the hill.
Presently Mr. Wyvern stopped and faced his companion.

'Are you serious in what you said just now? I mean about her love for
Mutimer?'

'Serious? Of course I am. Why should you ask such a question?'

'Because I find it difficult to distinguish between the things a young
man says in jealous pique and the real belief he entertains when he is
not throwing savage words about. You have convinced yourself that she
loved her husband in the true