gs, and when there he had forgotten to ask the person who could
have given him better information than any one else! "But it does not
signify," continued the archdeacon; "she said enough to me to make
that of no importance."

"And what did she say?"

"She said that she would never consent to marry Henry as long as
there was any suspicion abroad as to her father's guilt."

"And you believe her promise?"

"Certainly I do; I do not doubt that in the least. I put implicit
confidence in her. And I have promised her that if her father is
acquitted--I will withdraw my opposition."

"No!"

"But I have. And you would have done the same had you been there."

"I doubt that, my dear. I am not so impulsive as you are."

"You could not have helped yourself. You would have felt yourself
obliged to be equally generous with her. She came up to me and she
put her hand upon me--" "Psha!" said Mrs. Grantly. "But she did, my
dear, and then she said, 'I promise you that I will not become your
son's wife while people think papa stole this money.' What else could
I do?"

"And is she pretty?"

"Very pretty; very beautiful."

"And like a lady?"

"Quite like a lady. There is no mistake about that."

"And she behaved well?"

"Admirably," said the archdeacon, who was in a measure compelled
to justify the generosity into which he had been betrayed by his
feelings.

"Then she is a paragon," said Mrs. Grantly.

"I don't know what you may call a paragon, my dear. I say that she is
a lady, and that she is extremely good-looking, and that she behaved
very well. I cannot say less in her favour. I am sure you would not
say less yourself, if you had been present."

"She must be a wonderful young woman."

"I don't know anything about her being wonderful."

"She must be wonderful when she has succeeded both with the son and
with the father."

"I wish you had been there instead of me," said the archdeacon
angrily. Mrs. Grantly very probably wished so also, feeling that in
that case a more serene mode of business would have been adopted.
How keenly susceptible the archdeacon still was to the influences of
feminine charms, no one knew better than Mrs. Grantly, and whenever
she became aware that he had been in this way seduced from the wisdom
of his cooler judgment she always felt something akin to indignation
against the seducer. As for her husband, she probably told herself at
such moments that he was an old goose. "If you had been t