Majendie owned to a pang of shame as he turned from Maggie's door. In justice to Gorst it could not be said that he had betrayed the pa.s.sionate, perverted creature. And yet there was a sense in which Maggie's betrayal cried to Heaven, like the destruction of an innocent.

Majendie's finer instinct had surrendered to the charm of her appealing and astounding purity, by which he meant her cleanness from the mercenary taint. He had seen himself contending, grossly, with a fierce little vulgar schemer, who (he had been convinced) would hang on to poor Gorst's honour by fingers of a murderous tenacity. His own experience helped him to the vision. And Maggie had come to him, helpless as an injured child, and feverish from her hurt. He had asked her what she had wanted with Gorst, and it seemed that what Maggie wanted was "to help him."

He said to himself that he wouldn't be in Gorst's place for a good deal, to have that on his conscience.

As it happened, the prodigal's conscience was by no means easy. He called in Prior Street that evening to learn the result of his friend's intervention. He submitted humbly to Majendie's judgment of his conduct.

He agreed that he had been a brute to Maggie, that he might certainly do worse than marry her, and that his best reason for not marrying her was his knowledge that Maggie was ten times too good for him. He was only disposed to be critical of his friend's diplomacy when he learned that Majendie had not succeeded in persuading Maggie to marry Mr. Mumford.

But, in the end, he allowed himself to be convinced of the futility, not to say the indecency, of pressing Mr. Mumford upon the girl at the moment of her fine renunciation. He admitted that he had known all along that Maggie had her own high innocence. And when he realised the extent to which Majendie had "got him out of it," his conscience was roused by a salutary shock of shame.

But it was to Edith that he presented the perfection of his penitence.

From his stillness and abas.e.m.e.nt she gathered that, this time, her prodigal had fallen far. That night, before his departure, he confirmed her sad suspicions.

"It's awfully good of you," he said stiffly, "to let me come again."

"Good of me? Charlie!" Her eyes and voice reproached him for this strained formality.

"Yes. Mrs. Majendie's perfectly right. I've justified her bad opinion of me."

"I don't know that you've justified it. I don't know what you've done. No more does she, my dear. And you didn't think, did you, that Walter and I were going to give you up?"

"I'd have forgiven you if you had."

"I couldn't have forgiven myself, or Walter."

"Oh, Walter--if it hadn't been for him I should have gone to pieces this time. He's pulled me out of the tightest place I ever was in."

"I'm sure he was very glad to do it."

"I wish to goodness I could do the same for him."

"Why do you say that, Charlie?"

The prodigal became visibly embarra.s.sed. He seemed to be considering the propriety of a perfect frankness.

"I say, you don't mind my asking, do you? Has anything gone wrong with him and Mrs. Majendie?"

"What makes you think so?"

"Well, you see, I've got a sort of notion that she doesn't understand him. She's never realised in the least the stuff he's made of. He's the finest man I know on G.o.d's earth, and somehow, it strikes me that she doesn't see it."

"Not always, I'm afraid."

"Well--see here--you'll tell her, won't you, what he's done for me?

That ought to open her eyes a bit. You can give me away as much as ever you like, if you want to rub it in. Only tell her that I've chucked it--chucked it for good. He's made me loathe myself. Tell her that I'm not as bad as she thinks me, but that I probably would be if it hadn't been for him. And you, Edie, only I'm going to leave you out of it."

"You certainly may."

"It's because she knows all that already; and the point is to get her to appreciate him."

Edith smiled. "I see. And I'm to make what I like of you, if I can only get her to appreciate him?"

"Yes. Tell her that, as far as I'm concerned, I respect her att.i.tude profoundly."

"Very well. I'll tell her just what you've told me."

She spoke of it the next day, when Anne came to read to her in the afternoon. Anne was as punctual as ever in her devotion, but the pa.s.sion of it had been transferred to Peggy. The child was with them, playing feebly at her mother's knee, and Anne's mood was propitious. She listened intently. It was the first time that she had brought any sympathy into a discussion of the prodigal.

"Did he tell you," said she, "what Walter did for him?"

"No."

"Nor what had happened?"

"No. I didn't like to ask him. Whatever it was, it has gone very deep with him. Something has made a tremendous difference."

"Has it made him change his ways?"

"I believe it has. You see, Nancy, that's what Walter was trying for. He always had that sort of hold on him. That was why he was so anxious not to have him turned away."

Anne's face was about to harden, when Peggy gave the sad little cry that brought her mother's arms about her. Peggy had been trying vainly to climb into Anne's lap. She was now lifted up and held there while her feet trampled the broad maternal knees, and her hands played with Anne's face; stroking and caressing; smoothing her tragic brow to tenderness; tracing with soft, attentive fingers the line of her small, close mouth, until it smiled.

Anne seized the little hands and kissed them. "My lamb," she said, "what are you doing to your poor mother's face?" She did not see, as Edith saw, that Peggy, a consummate little sculptor, was moulding her mother's face into the face of love.

"I should never have dreamed," said Anne, "of turning him away, if I had thought he was really going to reform. Besides, I was afraid he would be bad for Walter."

"It didn't strike you that Walter might be good for him?"

"It struck me that I had to be strong for Walter."

"Ah, Walter can be strong for all of us." She paused on that, to let it sink in. Anne's face was thoughtful.

"Anne, if you believed that all I've said to you was true, would you still object to having Charlie here?"

"Certainly not. I would be the first to welcome him."

"Then, will you write to him of your own accord, and tell him that, if what I've told you is true, you'll be glad to see him? He knows why you couldn't receive him before, dear, and he respects you for it."

Anne thought better of Mr. Gorst for that respect. It was the proper att.i.tude; the att.i.tude she had once vainly expected Majendie to take.

"After all, what have I to do with it? He comes to see you."

"Yes, dear; but I shan't always be here for him to see. And if I thought that you would help Walter to look after him--will you?"

"I will do what I can. My little one!"

Anne bowed her head over the soft forehead of her little one. She had a glad and solemn vision of herself as the protector of the penitent. It was in keeping with all the sanct.i.ties and pieties she cherished. She had not forgotten that Canon Wharton (a saint if ever there was one) had enjoined on her the utmost charity to Mr. Gorst, should he turn from his iniquity.

She was better able to admit the likelihood of that repentance because Mr. Gorst had never stood in any close relation to her. His iniquity had not profoundly affected her. But she found it impossible to realise that Majendie's influence could count for anything in his redemption. Where her husband was concerned Anne's mind was made up, and it refused to acknowledge so fine a merit in so gross a man. She was by this time comfortably fixed in her att.i.tude, and any shock to it caused her positive uneasiness. Her att.i.tude was sacred; it had become one of the pillars of her spiritual life. She was constrained to look for justification lest she should put herself wrong with G.o.d.