Just as round the hereditary principle are grouped the State, the Church, Law, and Philanthropy, so round the dining-table at Worsted Skeynes sat the Squire, the Rector, Mr. Paramor, and Gregory Vigil, and none of them wished to be the first to speak.  At last Mr. Paramor, taking from his pocket Bellew’s note and George’s answer, which were pinned in strange alliance, returned them to the Squire.

“I understand the position to be that George refuses to give her up; at the same time he is prepared to defend the suit and deny everything.  Those are his instructions to me.”  Taking up the vase again, he sniffed long and deep at the rose.

Mr. Pendyce broke the silence.

“As a gentleman,” he said in a voice sharpened by the bitterness of his feelings, “I suppose he’s obliged——­”

Gregory, smiling painfully, added: 

“To tell lies.”

Mr. Pendyce turned on him at once.

“I’ve nothing to say about that, Vigil.  George has behaved abominably.  I don’t uphold him; but if the woman wishes the suit defended he can’t play the cur—­that’s what I was brought up to believe.”

Gregory leaned his forehead on his hand.

“The whole system is odious——­” he was beginning.

Mr. Paramor chimed in.

“Let us keep to the facts; without the system.”

The Rector spoke for the first time.

“I don’t know what you mean about the system; both this man and this woman are guilty——­”

Gregory said in a voice that quivered with rage: 

“Be so kind as not to use the expression, ‘this woman.’”

The Rector glowered.

“What expression then——­”

Mr. Pendyce’s voice, to which the intimate trouble of his thoughts lent a certain dignity, broke in: 

“Gentlemen, this is a question concerning the honour of my house.”

There was another and a longer silence, during which Mr. Paramor’s eyes haunted from face to face, while beyond the rose a smile writhed on his lips.

“I suppose you have brought me down here, Pendyce, to give you my opinion,” he said at last.  “Well; don’t let these matters come into court.  If there is anything you can do to prevent it, do it.  If your pride stands in the way, put it in your pocket.  If your sense of truth stands in the way, forget it.  Between personal delicacy and our law of divorce there is no relation; between absolute truth and our law of divorce there is no relation.  I repeat, don’t let these matters come into court.  Innocent and guilty, you will all suffer; the innocent will suffer more than the guilty, and nobody will benefit.  I have come to this conclusion deliberately.  There are cases in which I should give the opposite opinion.  But in this case, I repeat, there’s nothing to be gained by it.  Once more, then, don’t let these matters come into court.  Don’t give people’s tongues a chance.  Take my advice, appeal to George again to give you that promise.  If he refuses, well, we must try and bluff Bellew out of it.”