r Adela was interesting,
personally and still more as an illustration of a social experiment.

'How young she is!' was her remark to Mr. Westlake shortly after making
Adela's acquaintance. 'It will amuse you, the thought I had; I really
must tell it you. She realises my idea of a virgin mother. Haven't you
felt anything of the kind?'

Mr. Westlake smiled.

'Yes, I understand. Stella said something evidently traceable to the
same impression; her voice, she said, is full of forgiveness.'

'Excellent! And has she much to forgive, do you think?'

'I hope not.'

'Yet she is not exactly happy, I imagine?'

Mr. Westlake did not care to discuss the subject. The lady had recourse
to Stella for some account of Mr. Mutimer.

'He is a strong man,' Stella said in a tone which betrayed the
Socialist's enthusiasm. 'He stands for earth-subduing energy. I imagine
him at a forge, beating fire out of iron.'

'H'm! That's not quite the same thing as imagining him that beautiful
child's husband. No education, I suppose?'

'Sufficient. With more, he would no longer fill the place he does. He
can speak eloquently; he is the true voice of the millions who cannot
speak their own thoughts. If he were more intellectual he would become
commonplace; I hope he will never see further than he does now. Isn't
a perfect type more precious than a man who is neither one thing nor
another?'

'Artistically speaking, by all means.'

'In his case I don't mean it artistically. He is doing a great work.'

'A friend of mine--you don't know Hubert Eldon, I think?--tells me he
has ruined one of the loveliest valleys in England.'

'Yes, I dare say he has done that. It is an essential part of his
protest against social wrong. The earth renews itself, but a dead man or
woman who has lived without joy can never be recompensed.'

'She, of course, is strongly of the same opinion?'

'Adela is a Socialist.'

Mrs. Boscobel laughed rather satirically.

'I doubt it.'

Stella, when she went to sit with Adela, either at home or by the
sea-shore, often carried a book in her hand, and at Adela's request
she read aloud. In this way Adela first came to know what was meant
by literature, as distinguished from works of learning. The verse of
Shelley and the prose of Landor fell upon her ears; it was as though she
had hitherto lived in deafness. Sometimes she had to beg the reader to
pause for that day; her heart and mind seemed overfull; she could not
even s