After middle-age the blood grows stagnant, habit dulls the edge of appetite, a weariness of the mind and of the body makes one cease to taste well-used delights; a strong new stimulus is required to revive the emotional life that is sinking to decay.  Such a stimulus must not only be strong and new, it must be light, delicate, altogether strange.  The effect it produces is due to charm and spell as much as to substance and form.

To people who are elderly, youth itself, merely because it is youth, exercises a tremendous fascination.  It sheds an atmosphere that is pleasant to breathe.  It seems like a fountain of life in which, if we might bathe, we should take some rejuvenating virtue as well as a soothing bliss.  There is a common saying that it makes one feel young just to consort with young people.

Then imagine the selfish unprincipled wretch who at the same time feels the new stimulus, experiences the mysterious fascination, and craves for the revivifying delight.  Putting himself in the sinner’s place, Dale could realize the pressure that drove him to his sin.  He could estimate the fearful temptation offered by the mere presence of the fresh young innocent creature that one has begun to think about in this improper manner.  She comes and she goes before one’s eyes, piercing them with her beauty; she fills one with desire as wine fills a cup; she absorbs one, whether she knows it or not, dominates, overwhelms, makes one her sick and fainting slave.  And suppose that while one becomes her slave one remains her master.  To what a gigantic growth the temptation must rush up each time that one thinks she is utterly in one’s power!  How irresistible it must seem if she herself does not aid one to resist it, if through her ignorance or childish faith she invites the disaster one is struggling to avoid, if instead of flying from her danger she draws nearer and nearer to it.

But to yield to such temptation, however tremendous it may be, is abominable, disgusting, and inexpressibly base.  No explanation can palliate or apology prevail—­the crime remains the same crime, and he who commits it is not fit to live with decent upright men.  That was what Dale had felt fifteen years ago, and he felt it with increased conviction now because of the religious faith that had become his guide and comfort.  To a believing Baptist there is a peculiar sacredness, in unsullied innocence.

Two hours afterward, when he had transacted his business and drew near to home, he was still thinking of Mr. Barradine and the Orphanage for unguarded innocent girls.  He shook himself in the saddle, squared his shoulders, and held up his head as he rode into the yard.

“Here, take my horse,” he said sternly, as he swung his foot out of the stirrup.

Then, at the sound of a voice behind him, he felt a little shiver run down his spine, like the cold touch of superstitious fear.

It was only Norah calling to him.  She had come out into the rain to tell him that Mavis Dale had gone to Rodchurch and could not be back to tea.