ted result of my own
memory to his word. And I felt myself the more constrained to do
this, because, in a moment of forgetfulness, in the wantonness of
inconsiderate haste, with wicked thoughtlessness, I had allowed
myself to make a false statement,--unwittingly false, indeed,
nonetheless very false, unpardonably false. I had declared without
thinking, that the money had come to me from the hands of Mr. Soames,
thereby seeming to cast a reflection upon that gentleman. When I had
been guilty of so great a blunder, of so gross a violation of that
ordinary care which should govern all words between man and man,
especially when any question of money may be in doubt,--how could I
expect that any one should accept my statement when contravened by
that made by the dean? How, in such embarrassment, could I believe in
my own memory? Gentlemen, I did not believe my own memory. Though all
the little circumstances of that envelope, with its rich but perilous
freightage, came back upon me from time to time with an exactness
that has appeared to me to be almost marvellous, yet I have told
myself that it was not so! Gentlemen, if you please, we will go
into the house; my wife is there, and should no longer be left in
suspense." They passed on in silence for a few steps, till Crawley
spoke again. "Perhaps you will allow me the privilege to be alone
with her for one minute,--but for a minute. Her thanks shall not be
delayed, where thanks are so richly due."

"Of course," said Toogood, wiping his eyes with a large red bandana
handkerchief. "By all means. We'll take a little walk. Come along,
major." The major had turned his face away, and he also was weeping.
"By George! I never heard such a thing in all my life," said Toogood.
"I wouldn't have believed it if I hadn't seen it. I wouldn't indeed.
If I were to tell that up in London, nobody would believe me."

"I call that man a hero," said Grantly.

"I don't know about being a hero. I never quite knew what makes a
hero, if it isn't having three or four girls dying in love for you
at once. But to find a man who was going to let everything in the
world go against him, because he believed another fellow better than
himself! There's many a chap thinks another man is wool-gathering;
but this man has thought he was wool-gathering himself! It's not
natural; and the world wouldn't go on if there many like that. He's
beckoning us, and we had better go in."

Mr. Toogood went first, and the maj