sense of the word?'

'The conviction was forced upon me. Why did she marry him at all? What
led her to give herself, heart and soul, to Socialism, she who under
ordinary circumstances would have shrunk from that and all other _isms_?
Why should she make it a special entreaty to me to pursue her husband's
work? The zeal for his memory is nothing unanticipated; it issues
naturally from her former state of mind.'

'Your vehemence,' replied the vicar, smiling, 'is sufficient proof that
you don't think it impossible for all these questions to be answered
in another sense. I can't pretend to have read the facts of her life
infallibly, but suppose I venture a hint or two, just to give you matter
for thought. Why she married him I cannot wholly explain to myself, but
remember that she took that step very shortly after being brought to
believe that you, my good friend, were utterly unworthy of any true
woman's devotion. Remember, too, her brother's influence, and--well, her
mother's. Now, on the evening before she accepted Mutimer she called at
the Vicarage alone. Unfortunately I was away--was walking with you, in
fact. What she desired to say to me I can only conjecture; but it is not
impossible that she was driven by the common impulse which sends young
girls to their pastor when they are in grievous trouble and without
other friends.'

'Why did you never tell me of that?' cried Hubert.

'Because it would have been useless, and, to tell you the truth, I felt
I was in an awkward position, not far from acting indiscreetly. I did go
to see her the next morning, but only saw her mother, and heard of the
engagement. Adela never spoke to me of her visit.'

'But she may have come for quite other reasons. Her subsequent behaviour
remains.'

'Certainly. Here again I may be altogether wrong, but it seems to me
that to a woman of her character there was only one course open. Having
become his wife, it behoved her to be loyal, and especially--remember
this--it behoved her to put her position beyond doubt in the eyes of
others, in the eyes of one, it may be, beyond all. Does that throw no
light on your meeting with her in the wood, of which you make so much?'

Hubert's countenance shone, but only for an instant.

'Ingenious,' he replied, good-humouredly.

'Possibly no more,' Mr. Wyvern rejoined. 'Take it as a fanciful sketch
of how a woman's life _might_ be ordered. Such a life would not lack its
dignity.'

Neither spoke for a