s, although he's been asked to go on this reading party. Of
course, it's simply a question as to whether he works better at home or
with his friends. If he were a weak character, I think Mr. Alweed would
insist in his coming home, but Hector really cares for his work more
than anything. He's never been very good at games; his short sight
prevents him, poor boy, and as he very justly remarked, when he was
home last holidays, 'I don't see, mother, how I am going to do my duty
as a solicitor (that's what he hopes to be) if I don't work now. Many
men regard Cambridge as a time for play. Not so I.'"

"But I hope that if Hector comes home this Christmas he'll attend the
Chapel services. The influence your father might have on such a boy as
Hector, Mr. Warlock, a boy, sensitive and thoughtful ... I was saying,
Miss Pyncheon, that Hector--"

Miss Pyncheon was the soul of good-nature--but she was much more than
that. She was by far the most sensible, genial, and worldly of the
Inside Saints; it was, in fact, astonishing that she should be an
Inside Saint at all.

Of them all she impressed Martin the most, because there was nothing of
the crank about her. She went to theatres, to the seaside in the
summer, took in The Queen, and was a subscriber to Boots' Circulating
Library. She dressed quietly and in excellent taste--in grey or black
and white. She had jolly brown eyes and a dimple in the middle of her
chin. She was ready to discuss any question with any one, was
marvellously broad-minded and tolerant, and although she was both poor
and generous, always succeeded in making her little flat in Soho Square
pretty and attractive.

Her chief fault, perhaps, was that she cared for no one especially--she
had neither lovers nor parents nor sisters nor brothers, and to all her
friends she behaved with the same kind geniality, welcoming one as
another. She was thus aloof from them all and relied upon no one. The
centre of her life was, of course, her religion, but of this she never
spoke, although strangely enough no one doubted the intensity of her
belief and the reality of her devotion.

She was a determined follower of Mr. Warlock; what he said she
believed, but here, too, there seemed to be no personal attachment. She
did not allow criticism of him in her own presence, but, on the other
hand, she never spoke as though it would distress her very greatly to
lose him. He was a sign, a symbol ... If one symbol went another could
be