mately akin to the messenger
that a mere nothing might have pushed him into those vile clothes
and endowed him with that furtive look and that sinister aspect of
a helot. For one infinitesimal instant he was the messenger; and
shuddered. Then the illusion as swiftly faded, and--such being Louis'
happy temperament--was forgotten. He disappeared into the parlour,
took a piece of paper and an envelope from the small writing-table
behind Rachel's chair, and wrote a short note to Julian--a note from
which facetiousness was not absent--inviting him to come at once. He
rang the bell. Mrs. Tams entered, full of felicity because the great
altercation was over and concord established.

"Give this to that chap," said Louis, casually imperative, holding out
the note but scarcely glancing at Mrs. Tams.

"Yes, sir," said Mrs. Tarns with humble eagerness, content to be a
very minor tool in the hidden designs of the exalted.

"And then you can go to bed."

"Oh! It's of no consequence, I'm sure, sir," Mrs. Tams answered.

Louis heard her say importantly and condescendingly to the messenger--

"Here ye are, young man."

She shut the front door as though much relieved to get such a source
of peril and infection out of the respectable house.

Immediately afterwards strange things happened to Louis in the
parlour. He had intended to return at once to his wife in order to
continue the vague, staggered conversation about Julian's thunderbolt.
But he discovered that he could not persuade himself to rejoin Rachel.
A self-consciousness, growing every moment more acute and troublesome,
prevented him from so doing. He was afraid that he could not discuss
the vanished money without blushing, and it happened rarely that he
lost control of his features, which indeed he could as a rule mould
to the expression of a cherub whenever desirable. So he sat down in
a chair, the first chair to hand, any chair, and began to reflect. Of
course he was safe. The greatest saint on earth could not have been
safer than he was from conviction of a crime. He might be suspected,
but nothing could possibly be proved against him. Moreover, despite
his self-consciousness, he felt innocent; he really did feel innocent,
and even ill-used. The money had forced itself upon him in an
inexcusable way; he was convinced that he had never meant to
misappropriate it; assuredly he had received not a halfpenny of
benefit from it. The fault was entirely the old lady's. Yes, h