it affect my principles in any way. But even if I had been
inclined--if I had had no principles, I should have been just clever
enough to know better than to run any risk of the kind you suggest.
You do not know perhaps that you have injured your own standing
already--that there are houses in which you are not welcome because
you are suspected of intrigue."

"_Me_--suspected of intrigue!" he exclaimed. "It isn't possible!"

Beth laughed. "If it is so disagreeable to be suspected," she said,
"what would it be to be found out! And what have you gained by it?
What says the Dhammapada? '_There is bad reputation, and the evil way
(to hell); there is the short pleasure of the frightened in the arms
of the frightened, and the king imposes heavy punishment; therefore
let no man think of his neighbour's wife._'"

"It is evident that you don't trust me," he said in an injured tone.
"Ah, Beth! does the fact that we were boy and girl together not weigh
with you?"

"Well, it would," Beth said soberly, "even if worldly wisdom were my
only guide in life. I should think of the time that we got into that
scrape, and you wriggled out of it, leaving me to shift for myself as
best I could; and I should remember the boy is father to the man. But
I have been trying to show you that worldly wisdom is not my only
guide in life. I have professed the most positive puritan principles
of conduct, and given you the reasons upon which they are based, yet
you persist; you ignore what I say as if you had not heard me or did
not believe me, and pursue the subject as if you were trying to weary
me into agreement. And you have wearied me, but not into agreement;
so, if you please, we will not discuss it any longer."

"You will be sorry, I think, some day for the way you have treated
me," he exclaimed, showing temper; "and what you expect to gain by it
I cannot imagine."

"Oh, please," Beth protested, "I am not imbued with the commercial
spirit of the churches. I do not expect a percentage in the way of
reward on every simple duty I do."

"Virtue is its own reward," he sneered.

"It has been said that 'the pleasure of virtue is one which can only
be obtained on the express condition of its not being the object
sought,'" she rejoined good-naturedly. "Try it, Alfred, and see if you
do not become a happier man insensibly. Order your thoughts to other
and nobler ends, for thoughts are things, and we are branded or
beautified by them. An American sci