And in the depths of that absorption she felt secure, and her courage
laughed at the menace of life (though the notion of braving a church
full of people did intimidate the bride). Yet she judged Louis
realistically and not sentimentally. She was not conspicuously blind
to any aspect of his character; nor had the tremendous revulsion of
the previous night transformed him into another and a more heavenly
being for her. She admitted frankly to herself that he was not
blameless in the dark affair of the bank-notes. She would not deny
that in some ways he was untrustworthy, and might be capable of acts
of which the consequences were usually terrible. His irresponsibility
was notorious. And, being impulsive herself, she had no mercy for
his impulsiveness. As for his commonsense, was not her burning of the
circular addressed to Mrs. Maldon a sufficient commentary on it?
She was well aware that Louis' sins of omission and commission might
violently shock people of a certain temperament--people of her own
temperament in particular. These people, however, would fail to see
the other side of Louis. If she herself had merely heard of Louis,
instead of knowing him, she would probably have set him down as
undesirable.
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