“I do not think,” said Mrs. Lorraine quietly, “that there is any use in your asking me what you should do, for I know what you will do, whether it accords with any one’s opinion or no.  And yet you would find a great advantage in having money.”

“Oh, I know that,” he said readily.  “I should like to be rich beyond anything that ever happened in a drama; and I should take my chance of all the evil influences that money is supposed to exert.  Do you know, I think you rich people are very unfairly treated.”

“But we are not rich,” said Mrs. Kavanagh, passing at the time.  “Cecilia and I find ourselves very poor sometimes.”

“But I quite agree with Mr. Ingram, mamma,” said Cecilia—­as if any one had had the courage to disagree with Mr. Ingram!—­“rich people are shamefully ill-treated.  If you go to a theatre, now, you find that all the virtues are on the side of the poor, and if there are a few vices, you get a thousand excuses for them.  No one takes account of the temptations of the rich.  You have people educated from their infancy to imagine that the whole world was made for them, every wish they have gratified, every day showing them people dependent on them and grateful for favors; and no allowance is made for such a temptation to become haughty, self-willed and overbearing.  But of course it stands to reason that the rich never have justice done them in plays and stories, for the people who write are poor.”

“Not all of them.”

“But enough to strike an average of injustice.  And it is very hard.  For it is the rich who buy books and who take boxes at the theatres, and then they find themselves grossly abused; whereas the humble peasant who can scarcely read at all, and who never pays more than sixpence for a seat in the gallery, is flattered and coaxed and caressed until one wonders whether the source of virtue is the drinking of sour ale.  Mr. Ingram, you do it yourself.  You impress mamma and me with the belief that we are miserable sinners if we are not continually doing some act of charity.  Well, that is all very pleasant and necessary, in moderation; but you don’t find the poor folks so very anxious to live for other people.  They don’t care much what becomes of us.  They take your port wine and flannels as if they were conferring a favor on you, but as for your condition and prospects in this world and the next, they don’t trouble much about that.  Now, mamma, just wait a moment.”

“I will not.  You are a bad girl,” said Mrs. Kavanagh severely.  “Here has Mr. Ingram been teaching you and making you better for ever so long back, and you pretend to accept his counsel and reform yourself; and then all at once you break out, and throw down the tablets of the law, and conduct yourself like a heathen.”

“Because I want him to explain, mamma.  I suppose he considers it wicked of us to start for Switzerland to-morrow.  The money we shall spend in traveling might have despatched a cargo of muskets to some missionary station, so that—­”