 up and down.
    »Well, no, I can't see that. But I tell you what would make it simpler: do
you think Mr. Wyvern would come if I asked him?«
    »Ah, now, that would be capital! Oh, ask Mr. Wyvern by all means. Then, of
course, I should be delighted to accept.«
    »But I haven't much hope that he'll come. I rather think he regards me as
his enemy. And, you see, I never go to church.«
    »What a pity that is, Mr. Mutimer! Ah, if I could only persuade you to think
differently about those things! There really are so many texts that read quite
like Socialism; I was looking them over with Adela on Sunday. What a sad thing
it is that you go so astray! It distresses me more than you think. Indeed, if I
may tell you such a thing, I pray for you nightly.«
    Mutimer made a movement of discomfort, but laughed off the subject.
    »I'll go and see the vicar, at all events,« he said. »But must your coming
depend on his?«
    Mrs. Waltham hesitated.
    »It really would make things easier.«
    »Might I, in that case, hope that Miss Waltham would come?«
    Richard seemed to exert himself to ask the question. Mrs. Waltham sank her
eyes, smiled feebly, and in the end shook her head.
    »On a public occasion, I'm really afraid -«
    »I'm sure she would like to know Mrs. Westlake,« urged Richard, without his
usual confidence. »And if you and her brother -«
    »If it were not a Socialist gathering.«
    Richard uncrossed his legs and sat for a moment looking into the fire. Then
he turned suddenly.
    »Mrs. Waltham, may I ask her myself?«
    She was visibly agitated. There was this time no affectation in the
tremulous lips and the troublous, unsteady eyes. Mrs. Waltham was not by nature
the scheming mother who is indifferent to the upshot if she can once get her
daughter loyally bound to a man of money. Adela's happiness was a very real care
to her; she would never have opposed an unobjectionable union on which she found
her daughter's heart bent, but circumstances had a second time made offer of
brilliant advantages, and she had grown to deem it an ordinance of the higher
powers that Adela should marry possessions. She flattered herself that her
