ar; but you won't mind my speaking frankly.
And if I'm right, and he has begun pestering you, I can't blame you for
resigning. The man isn't safe."

His look carried interrogation at once shy and fatherly. She forced
herself to meet his eyes and nod the answer which her cheeks already
published.

"It is hateful," she murmured. "Yes, he asked me to marry him."

"I _told_ you he was afflicted," said Mr. Benny, still with simple
seriousness; then, catching a sudden twinkle in her eyes, "Eh? What did I
say? My dear, I didn't mean it that way!"

Mr. Benny had judged at once more charitably and more correctly than
Hester. Had she looked up yesterday when she passed Mr. Sam at the foot
of the stairs, she might have guessed the truth from his face.

The man was afflicted, and knew it; had suddenly discovered it, and was
afraid of himself--for the moment, abjectly afraid. All his life he had
been nursing a devil, feeding it on religion, clothing it in
self-righteousness, so carefully touching up its toilet that it passed for
saint rather than devil--especially in his own eyes, trained as they were
in self-deception. For every action, mean or illiberal or tricky or
downright cruel, he had a justificatory text; for his few defeats a
constant salve in the thought that his vanquishers were carnal men, sons
of Belial, and would find, themselves in hell some day. He was Dives or
Lazarus as occasion served. If a plan miscarried, the Lord was chastening
him; if, as oftener happened, it went prosperously, the Lord was looking
after His own; but always the plan itself, being _his_ plan, was certainly
righteous, because he was a righteous man. A good tree could not bring
forth evil fruit.

But all this while the devil had been growing fat and strong; and now on a
sudden it had burst forth like a giant, mad, uncontrollable, flinging away
disguise, a devil for all to see. There was no text, even in Solomon,
which could be stretched to excuse tying up a small blind child and
flogging him with a belt. He had done a thing for which men go to prison.
Worse, he had not been far from a crime for which the law puts men to
death. In his rage he had been absolutely blind, each blow deadening
prudence, calling for another blow. If Hester Marvin had not run in,
where would he have ended?

It happened to him now as it has happened to many a man fed upon
conventional religion and accustomed to walk an aisle in public and
eminent