not be helped, and
even for the man's own sake she felt that she must win him over.

"There is one way, Gregory, in which I don't think it ought to be
done," she said. "Yon took over Wyllard's obligations when you took
the farm, and I think you should keep the two Morans on."

Hawtrey started. "Ah!" he said, "Mrs. Hastings has been setting you
on; I partly expected it."

"She told me," Agatha admitted. "Unless you will look at the thing as
I do, I could almost wish she hadn't. The thought of that woman shut
up in the woods all winter only to find that what she must have to bear
has all been thrown away troubles me. Wyllard promised to keep those
men on, didn't he?"

"There was no regular engagement so far as I can make out."

"Still, Moran seems to have understood that he was to be kept on."

"Yes," admitted Hawtrey, "he evidently does. If the market had gone
with us I'd have fallen in with his views. As it hasn't, every man's
wages count."

Agatha was conscious of a little thrill of repugnance. Of late
Gregory's ideas had rather frequently jarred on hers.

"Does that release you?"

Hawtrey did not answer this.

"I'll keep those men on if you want me to," he said.

Agatha winced at this. She had discovered that she must not look for
too much from Gregory, but to realise that he had practically no sense
of moral obligation, and could only be influenced to do justice by the
expectation of obtaining her favour positively hurt her.

"I want them kept on, but I don't want you to do it for that reason,"
she said. "Can't you grasp the distinction, Gregory?"

A trace of darker colour crept into Hawtrey's face, but while she was a
little astonished at this he looked at her steadily. He had not
thought much about her during the last month, but now the faint scorn
in her voice had stirred him.

"Now," he said, "there are just three reasons, Aggy, why you should
have troubled yourself about this thing. You are, perhaps, a little
sorry for Moran's wife, but as you haven't even seen her that can
hardly count for much. The next is, that you don't care to see me
doing what you regard as a shabby thing; perhaps it is a shabby thing
in some respects, but I feel it's justifiable. Of course, if that's
your reason there's a sense in which, while not exactly
complimentary--it's consoling."

He broke off, and looked at her with a question in his eyes, and it
cost Agatha an effort to meet them. She was not pr