that age. "Weakens a man's self-control, besides
dulling his palate. . . . They tell me, by the way, that after you left
I beat Silk."

Ruth looked grave. "You did wrong, then."

"Silk is a beast."

"An excellent reason for not making him your guest; none for striking
him at your own table."

"Perhaps not." Sir Oliver shrugged his shoulders. "Well, he can have
his revenge, if he wants it."

"How so? As a clergyman he cannot offer to fight you, and as a coward
he would not if he could."

"Is one, then, to be considerate with cowards?"

"Certainly, if you honour cowards with your friendship."

"Friendship! . . . The dog likes his platter and I suffer him for his
talk. When his talk trespasses beyond sufferance, I chastise him.
That's how I look at it."

"I am sorry, my lord, that Mr. Silk should make the third on your list
this morning."

"Oh, come; you don't ask me to _apologise_ to Silk!"

"To him rather than to me."

"But--oh nonsense! He was disgusting--unspeakable, I tell you. If you
suppose I struck him for nothing--"

"I do not."

"You cannot think what he said."

"Something about me, was it not?" Then, as Sir Oliver stood silent,
"Something a great many folk--your guests included--are quite capable of
thinking about me, though they have not Mr. Silk's gift of language."

"--That gift for which (you will go on to remind me) I suffer him."

"No; that gift which (you said) trespasses beyond sufferance."
She did not remind him that he, after all, had exposed her and provoked
Mr. Silk's uncleanly words.

Both were beating time now. He had come, as was meet, to offer an
apology, and with no intent beyond. He found not only that Ruth
Josselin was grown a woman surpassing fair, but that her mere presence
(it seemed, by no will of hers, but in spite of her will) laid hold of
him, commanding him to face a further intent. It was wonderful, and yet
just at this moment it mattered little, that the daylight soberly
confirmed what had dazzled his drunkenness over night; that her speech
added good sense to beauty. . . . What mattered at the moment was a
sense of urgency, oppressing and oppressed by an equal sense of
helplessness.

He had set the forces working and, with that, had chosen to stand
aside--in indolence partly, partly in a careful cultivated indifference,
but in part also obeying motives more creditable. He had stood aside,
promising the result, but himself dallying with time.