Lifting her eyes from Kesiah’s face, she fixed them on a small old picture of the elder Jonathan, which hung under a rusty sword above the bed.  For the first time there came to her an impulse of compassion for the man who was her father.  Perhaps he, also, had suffered because life had driven him to do the things that he hated—­perhaps he, also, had had his secret chamber in which his spirit was crucified?  With the thought something in her heart, which was like a lump of ice, melted suddenly, and she felt at peace.  “Because I’ve lived,” she said softly to herself, “I can understand.”

And on the opposite side of the bed, between the long white curtains, Kesiah was thinking, “Because I’ve never lived, but have stood apart and watched life, I can understand.”

Turning away presently, Molly went to the door, where she stood waiting until the elder woman joined her.

“Is Mr. Chamberlayne still with Aunt Angela?” she asked.

“Yes.  He was on his way to visit her when Cephus met him near the cross-roads.”  For an instant she paused to catch her breath, and then added softly, “Angela is bearing it beautifully.”

Stooping over, she picked up a few scattered rose leaves from the threshold and dropped them into the empty basket before she followed Molly down the hall of the west wing to the lattice door, which opened on the side-garden.  Here the rustling of dead leaves grew louder, and faint scents of decay and mould were wafted through the evanescent beauty of the Indian summer.

While they stood there, Mr. Chamberlayne came down the staircase, wiping his eyes, which were very red, on his white silk handkerchief.

“She bears it beautifully, just as we might have expected,” he said “I have seldom witnessed such fortitude, such saintly resignation to what she feels to be the will of God.”

Molly’s eyes left his face and turned to the purple and gold of the meadows, where webs of silver thistledown were floating over the path she had trodden only a few hours ago.  Nothing had changed in the landscape—­the same fugitive bloom was on the fields, the same shadows were on the hillside, the same amber light was on the turnpike.  She thought of many things in that instant, but beneath them all, like an undercurrent, ran the knowledge that Mrs. Gay was “bearing it beautifully” behind her closed shutters.  When her mind went back to the past, she remembered the elder Jonathan, who had perished in the fine silken mesh of the influence he was powerless to break.  After this came the memory of the day when Janet Merryweather had flung herself on the mercy of the gentle heart, and had found it iron.  And then she thought of the son, who had drifted into deceit and subterfuge because he was not strong enough to make war on a thing so helpless.  He, also, had died because he dared not throw off that remorseless tyranny of weakness.  Without that soft yet indomitable influence, he would never have lied in the beginning, would never have covered his faithlessness with the hypocrisy of duty.