“It’s a painful subject to me.”

Mr. Paramor drew a face on his blotting-paper.

“I have come,” went on Gregory, “about a divorce for my ward.”

“Mrs. Jaspar Bellew?”

“Yes; her position is intolerable.”

Mr. Paramor gave him a searching look.

“Let me see:  I think she and her husband have been separated for some time.”

“Yes, for two years.”

“You’re acting with her consent, of course?”

“I have spoken to her.”

“You know the law of divorce, I suppose?”

Gregory answered with a painful smile: 

“I’m not very clear about it; I hardly ever look at those cases in the paper.  I hate the whole idea.”

Mr. Paramor smiled again, became instantly grave, and said: 

“We shall want evidence of certain things, Have you got any evidence?”

Gregory ran his hand through his hair.

“I don’t think there’ll be any difficulty,” he said.  “Bellew agrees —­they both agree!”

Mr. Paramor stared.

“What’s that to do with it?”

Gregory caught him up.

“Surely, where both parties are anxious, and there’s no opposition, it can’t be difficult.”

“Good Lord!” said Mr. Paramor.

“But I’ve seen Bellew; I saw him yesterday.  I’m sure I can get him to admit anything you want!”

Mr. Paramor drew his breath between his teeth.

“Did you ever,” he said drily, “hear of what’s called collusion?”

Gregory got up and paced the room.

“I don’t know that I’ve ever heard anything very exact about the thing at all,” he said.  “The whole subject is hateful to me.  I regard marriage as sacred, and when, which God forbid, it proves unsacred, it is horrible to think of these formalities.  This is a Christian country; we are all flesh and blood.  What is this slime, Paramor?”

With this outburst he sank again into the chair, and leaned his head on his hand.  And oddly, instead of smiling, Mr. Paramor looked at him with haunting eyes.

“Two unhappy persons must not seem to agree to be parted,” he said.  “One must be believed to desire to keep hold of the other, and must pose as an injured person.  There must be evidence of misconduct, and in this case of cruelty or of desertion.  The evidence must be impartial.  This is the law.”

Gregory said without looking up: 

“But why?”

Mr. Paramor took his violets out of the water, and put them to his nose.

“How do you mean—­why?”

“I mean, why this underhand, roundabout way?”

Mr. Paramor’s face changed with startling speed from its haunting look back to his smile.

“Well,” he said, “for the preservation of morality.  What do you suppose?”

“Do you call it moral so to imprison people that you drive them to sin in order to free themselves?”