“Of course I didn’t think it out at the time.  But I don’t deny that I had a satisfaction in the notion of the hornets’ nest he was poking his thick head into.  It makes me sick, now, to think I had.  I oughtn’t to have let him; he was perfectly innocent in it.  After the letter went, I wanted to tell him, but I couldn’t; and then I took the chances too.  I don’t believe he could have ever got forward in politics; he’s too honest—­or he isn’t dishonest in the right way.  But that doesn’t let me out.  I don’t defend myself!  I did wrong; I behaved badly.  But I’ve suffered for it.

“I’ve had a foreboding all the time that it would come to the worst, and felt like a murderer with his victim when I’ve been alone with Stoller.  When I could get away from him I could shake it off, and even believe that it hadn’t happened.  You can’t think what a nightmare it’s been!  Well, I’ve ruined Stoller politically, but I’ve ruined myself, too.  I’ve spoiled my own life; I’ve done what I can never explain to—­to the people I want to have believe in me; I’ve got to steal away like the thief I am.  Good-by!” He jumped to his feet, and put out his hand to March, and then to Mrs. March.

“Why, you’re not going away now!” she cried, in a daze.

“Yes, I am.  I shall leave Carlsbad on the eleven-o’clock train.  I don’t think I shall see you again.”  He clung to her hand.  “If you see General Triscoe—­I wish you’d tell them I couldn’t—­that I had to—­that I was called away suddenly—­Good-by!” He pressed her hand and dropped it, and mixed with the crowd.  Then he came suddenly back, with a final appeal to March:  “Should you—­do you think I ought to see Stoller, and—­and tell him I don’t think I used him fairly?”

“You ought to know—­” March began.

But before he could say more, Burnamy said, “You’re right,” and was off again.

“Oh, how hard you were with him, my dear!” Mrs. March lamented.

“I wish,” he said, “if our boy ever went wrong that some one would be as true to him as I was to that poor fellow.  He condemned himself; and he was right; he has behaved very badly.”

“You always overdo things so, when you act righteously!”

“Now, Isabel!”

“Oh, yes, I know what you will say.  But I should have tempered justice with mercy.”

Her nerves tingled with pity for Burnamy, but in her heart she was glad that her husband had had strength to side with him against himself, and she was proud of the forbearance with which he had done it.  In their earlier married life she would have confidently taken the initiative on all moral questions.  She still believed that she was better fitted for their decision by her Puritan tradition and her New England birth, but once in a great crisis when it seemed a question of their living, she had weakened before it, and he, with no such advantages, had somehow met the issue with courage and conscience.  She could not believe he did so by inspiration, but she had since let him take the brunt of all such issues and the responsibility.  He made no reply, and she said:  “I suppose you’ll admit now there was always something peculiar in the poor boy’s manner to Stoller.”