’Then you deliberately adapt yourself to the prejudices of unintelligent people?’

‘I do so, deliberately,’ assented the vicar, with one of his fleeting smiles.

Richard went away feeling sorry that he had courted this rejection.  He would never have thought of inviting a ‘parson’ but for Mrs. Waltham’s suggestion.  After all, it it mattered little whether Adela came to the luncheon or not.  He had desired her presence because he wished her to see him as an entertainer of guests such as the Westlakes. whom she would perceive to be people of refinement; it occurred to him, too, that such an occasion might aid his snit by exciting her ambition; for he was anything but confident of immediate success with Adela, especially since recent conversations with Mrs. Waltham.  But in any case she would attend the afternoon ceremony, when his glory would be proclaimed.

Mrs. Waltham was anxiously meditative of plans for bringing Adela to regard her Socialist wooer with more favourable eyes.  She, too, had hopes that Mutimer’s fame in the mouths of men might prove an attraction, yet she suspected a strength of principle in Adela which might well render all such hopes vain.  And she thought it only too likely, though observation gave her no actual assurance of this, that the girl still thought of Hubert Eldon in a way to render it doubly hard for any other man to make an impression upon her.  It was dangerous, she knew, to express her abhorrence of Hubert too persistently; yet, on the other hand, she was convinced that Adela had been so deeply shocked by the revelations of Hubert’s wickedness that her moral nature would be in arms against her lingering inclination.  After much mental wear and tear, she decided to adopt the strong course of asking Alfred’s assistance.  Alfred was sure to view the proposed match with hearty approval, and, though he might not have much influence directly, he could in all probability secure a potent ally in the person of Letty Tew.  This was rather a brilliant idea; Mrs. Waltham waited impatiently for her son’s return from Belwick on Saturday.

She broached the subject to him with much delicacy.

’I am so convinced, Alfred, that it would be for your sister’s happiness.  There really is no harm whatever in aiding her inexperience; that is all that I wish to do.  I’m sure you understand me?’

‘I understand well enough,’ returned the young man; ’but if you convince Adela against her will you’ll do a clever thing.  You’ve been so remarkably successful in closing her mind against all arguments of reason—­’

’Now, Alfred, do not begin and talk in that way!  It has nothing whatever to do with the matter.  This is entirely a personal question.’

’Nothing of the kind.  It’s a question of religious prejudice.  She hates Mutimer because he doesn’t go to church, there’s the long and short of it.’

’Adela very properly condemns his views, but that’s quite a different thing from hating him.’