"She sorely wants
humbling!"
"You do not know her, Mr. Grant, if you think anything I could do
would have that effect on her."
"Pardon me, my lady; I did not imagine it your task to humble her!
But you need not let her ride over you as she used to do; she knows
nothing really, and a great many things unreally. Unreal knowledge
is worse than ignorance.--Would not Miss Graeme be a better friend?"
"She is much more lovable; but she does not trouble her head about
the things I care for.--I mean religion," she added hesitatingly.
"So much the better,--"
"Mr. Grant!"
"You did not let me finish, my lady!--So much the better, I was
going to say, till she begins to trouble her heart about it--or
rather to untrouble her heart with it! The pharisee troubled his
head, and no doubt his conscience too, and did not go away
justified; but the poor publican, as we with our stupid pity would
call him, troubled his heart about it; and that trouble once set a
going, there is no fear. Head and all must soon follow.--But how am
I to get rid of this plaster without being seen?"
"I will show you the way to your own stair without going down--the
way we came once, you may remember. You can take it to the top of
the house till it is dark.--But I do not feel comfortable about my
uncle's visit. Can it be that he suspects something? Perhaps he
knows all about the chapel--and that stair too!"
"He is a man to enjoy having a secret!--But our discovery bears out
what we were saying as to the likeness of house and man--does it
not?"
"You don't mean there is anything like that in me?" rejoined
Arctura, looking frightened.
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