‘It is to be hoped that she may be in other hands before that,’ replied his son.  ’I do not mean to say anything against my step-mother;—­but for a young woman it is generally best that she should be married.  And in Hester’s peculiar position, she ought to have the chance of choosing for herself.’

In this way something almost like a conspiracy was made on behalf of Caldigate.  And yet the old man did not as yet abandon his prejudices against the miner.  A man who had at so early an age done so much to ruin himself, and had then sprung so suddenly from ruin to prosperity, could not, he thought, be regarded as a steady well-to-do man of business.  He did agree that, as regarded Hester, the prison-bars should be removed; but he did not think that she should be invited to walk forth with Mr. John Caldigate.  Robert declared that his sister was quite able to form an opinion of her own, and boldly suggested that Hester should be allowed to come and dine at his house.  ‘To meet the man?’ asked the banker in dismay.  ‘Yes,’ said Robert.  ’He isn’t an ogre.  You needn’t be afraid of him.  I shall be there,—­and Margaret.  Bring her yourself if you are afraid of anything.  No plant ever becomes strong by being kept always away from the winds of heaven.’  To this he could not assent at the time.  He knew that it was impossible to assent without consulting his wife.  But he was brought so far round as to think that if nothing but his own consent were wanting, his girl would be allowed to go and meet the ogre.

‘I suppose we ought to wish that Hester should be married some day,’ he said to his wife about this time.  She shuddered and dashed her hands together as though deprecating some evil,—­some event which she could hardly hope to avoid but which was certainly an evil.  ’Do you not wish that yourself?’ She shook her head.  ’Is it not the safest condition in which a woman can live?’

‘How shall any one be safe among the dangers of this world, Nicholas?’ She habitually called her husband by his Christian name, but she was the only living being who did so.

‘More safe then?’ said he.  ‘It is the natural condition of a woman.’

‘I do not know.  Sin is natural.’

‘Very likely.  No doubt.  But marriage is not sinful.’

‘Men are so wicked.’

‘Some of them are.’

‘Where is there one that is not steeped in sin over his head?’

‘That applies to women also; doesn’t it?’ said the banker petulantly.  He was almost angry because she was introducing a commonplace as to the world’s condition into a particular argument as to their daughter’s future life,—­which he felt to be unfair and illogical.

’Of course it does, Nicholas.  We are all black and grimed with sin, men and women too; and perhaps something more may be forgiven to men because they have to go out into the world and do their work.  But neither one nor the other can be anything but foul with sin;—­except,—­except—­’