, would be haunted by perception
of the curious glances, and curious comments, which must of necessity
attend Richard through all the brilliant pageant of the London season.
How would he bear it? And then--self-distrust laying fearful hands upon
her--how would she bear it, too? Would her late acquired serenity of
soul depart, her faith in the gracious purposes of Almighty God suffer
eclipse? Would she fall back into her former condition of black anger
and revolt? She prayed not. So long as these evils did not descend upon
her, she could bear the rest well enough. For, could she but keep her
faith, Katherine was beginning to regard all other suffering which
might be in store for her as a negligible quantity. With her healthy
body, and wholesome memories of a great and perfect human love, it was
almost impossible that she should adopt a morbid and self-torturing
attitude. Yet any religious ideal, worth the name, will always have in
it an ascetic element. And that element was so far present with her
that personal suffering had come to bear a not wholly unlovely aspect.
She had ceased to gird against it. So long as Richard was amused and
fairly content, so long as the evil which had been abroad in Brockhurst
House, that stormy autumn night, could be frustrated, and the
estrangement between herself and Richard,--unacknowledged, yet sensibly
present,--which that evil had begotten, might be lessened she cared
little what sacrifices she made, what fatigue, exertion, even pain, she
might be called on to endure. An enthusiasm of self-surrender animated
her.

During the last five months, slowly and with stumbling feet; yet very
surely, she had carried her life and the burden of it up to a higher
plane. And, from that more elevated standpoint, she saw both past
events and existing relationships in perspective, according to their
just and permanent values. Only one object, one person, refused to
range itself, and stood out from the otherwise calm, if pensive,
landscape as a threatening danger, a monument of things wicked and
fearful. Katherine tried to turn her eyes from that object, for it
provoked in her a great hatred, a burning indignation, sadly at
variance with the saintly ideals which had so captivated her mind and
heart. Katherine remained--always would remain, happily for
others--very much a woman. And, as woman and mother, she could not but
hate that other woman who had, as she feared, come very near seducing
her son.