It was as though the white-faced, passionless woman beside her read her thoughts.

“If you would be purified,” said Catherine, “if you would cast out the devil that is within you, you will have to abide meekly by such penance as is ordained.  You must submit yourself to pain.”

At the words a memory of long ago stirred in Magda’s mind.  She remembered that when her father had beaten her as a child he had said:  “If you hurt people enough you can stop them from committing sin.”

Groping dimly for some light that might elucidate the problems which bewildered her, Magda clutched at the words as though they were a revelation.  They seemed to point to the only way by which she might repair the past.

Catherine, watching closely the changes on the pale, sensitive face, spoke again.

“Of course, if you feel you have not the strength of will to keep your vow, you must not take it.”

The words acted like a spur.  Instantly, Magda’s decision was taken.

“If I take the vow, I shall have strength of mind to keep it,” she said.

The following evening Magda composedly informed Gillian that she proposed to take a vow of expiation and retire into the community of the Sisters of Penitence for a year.  Gillian was frankly aghast; she had never dreamed of any such upshot to the whole miserable business of Magda’s broken engagement.

“But it is madness!” she protested.  “You would hate it!”

Magda nodded.

“That’s just it.  I’ve done what I liked all my life.  And you know what the result has been!  Now I propose to do what I don’t like for a year.”

Neither persuasion nor exhortation availed to shake her resolution, and in despair Gillian referred the matter to Lady Arabella, hoping she might induce Magda to change her mind.

Lady Arabella accepted the news with unexpected composure.

“It is just what one might expect from the child of Hugh Vallincourt,” she said thoughtfully.  “It’s the swing of the pendulum.  There’s always been that tendency in the Vallincourts—­the tendency towards atonement by some sort of violent self-immolation.  They are invariably excessive—­either excessively bad like the present man, Rupert, or excessively devout like Hugh and Catherine!  By the way, the Sisters of Penitence is the community Catherine first joined.  I wonder if she is there still?  Probably she’s dead by now, though.  I remember hearing some years ago that she was seriously ill—­somewhere about the time of Hugh’s death.  That’s the last I ever heard of her.  I’ve been out of touch with the whole Vallincourt family for so many years now that I don’t know what has become of them.”

“You don’t mean to say that you’re going to let Magda do what she proposes?” exclaimed Gillian, in dismayed astonishment.

“There’s never much question of ‘letting’ Magda do things, is there?” retorted Lady Arabella.  “If she’s made up her mind to be penitential—­penitential she’ll be!  I dare say it won’t do her any harm.”