the service of the
speaker; fortunately, turning to thank her for it by a look, he missed
detecting her pupil's smile. She could fancy so well Fanny's little
_moue_, combining amusement, vexation, and impertinence, while
undergoing the ecclesiastical censure.

"You must be merciful to Mrs. Molyneux," she remarked, with a demure
gravity that did her credit under the circumstances. "She is my greatest
friend, you know. When a wife is so very fond of her husband, surely
there is some excuse for her adopting his prejudices for and against
people?"

The pastor brightened up suddenly: he had just recollected another fact
to fire off against the _bete noir_.

"I forgot to tell you that Major Keene is much addicted to play, and,
besides, is intimate with the Vicomte de Chateaumesnil. _Noscitur a
sociis._" The reverend man was an indifferent classic, but he had a way
of flashing scraps out of grammars and _Analecta Minora_ before women
and others unlikely to be down upon him, as if they were quotations from
some recondite author.

"You can not mean that cripple who is drawn about in a wheel-chair?"
Cecil asked. "We saw him to-day, only for a moment, for he drew his
cloak over his face as we passed. I never saw such a melancholy wreck,
and I pitied him so much that I fear he will haunt me."

Far deeper would have been the compassion had she guessed at the pang
that shot straight to Armand's heart as he veiled his blasted features
and haggard eyes, feeling bitterly that such as he were not worthy to
look upon her in the glory of her brilliant beauty.

"A notorious atheist and profligate," was the reply. "We can not regard
his sore affliction in any other light than a judgment--a manifest
judgment, dear Miss Tresilyan."

There was grave disapproval and just a shade of contempt in the face of
one of his hearers as she said, "The hand of God is laid so heavily
there that man may surely forbear him." But Mrs. Danvers struck in to
her favorite's rescue, rejoicing in an opportunity of displaying her
partisanship.

"A judgment, of course. It would be sinful to doubt it. Besides, do not
_others_ suffer?" (She cast up her eyes here pointedly, as though she
said, "There may be more perfect saints, but if you want a fair specimen
of the fine old English martyr--_me voici_.") "Cecil, my love, I wonder
you did not perceive Major Keene's true character at once. You were
talking to him a good deal the other day."

"He did not favor m