Here she read that there were plenty of apparent instances of this in Scripture, and that it was formed into a recognized system in the early Church.  With reference to direct acts of deception, it was argued that since there were confessedly cases where killing is no murder, might there not be cases where lying is no sin?  It could not be right—­or, indeed, anything but most absurd—­to say in effect that no doubt circumstances would occur where every sound man would tell a lie, and would be a brute or a fool if he did not, and to say at the same time that it is quite indefensible in principle.  Duty was the key to conduct then, and if in such cases duties appeared to clash they would be found not to do so on examination.  The lesser duty would yield to the greater, and therefore ceased to be a duty.

This author she found to be not so tolerable; he distracted her.  She put him aside and gave over reading, having decided on this second point, that she would, at any hazard, represent the truth to Lord Mountclere before listening to another word from him.  ‘Well, at last I have done,’ she said, ‘and am ready for my role.’

In looking back upon her past as she retired to rest, Ethelberta could almost doubt herself to be the identical woman with her who had entered on a romantic career a few short years ago.  For that doubt she had good reason.  She had begun as a poet of the Satanic school in a sweetened form; she was ending as a pseudo-utilitarian.  Was there ever such a transmutation effected before by the action of a hard environment?  It was not without a qualm of regret that she discerned how the last infirmity of a noble mind had at length nearly departed from her.  She wondered if her early notes had had the genuine ring in them, or whether a poet who could be thrust by realities to a distance beyond recognition as such was a true poet at all.  Yet Ethelberta’s gradient had been regular:  emotional poetry, light verse, romance as an object, romance as a means, thoughts of marriage as an aid to her pursuits, a vow to marry for the good of her family; in other words, from soft and playful Romanticism to distorted Benthamism.  Was the moral incline upward or down?

37.  Knollsea—­an ornamental villa

Her energies collected and fermented anew by the results of the vigil, Ethelberta left town for Knollsea, where she joined Picotee the same evening.  Picotee produced a letter, which had been addressed to her sister at their London residence, but was not received by her there, Mrs. Chickerel having forwarded it to Knollsea the day before Ethelberta arrived in town.

The crinkled writing, in character like the coast-line of Tierra del Fuego, was becoming familiar by this time.  While reading the note she informed Picotee, between a quick breath and a rustle of frills, that it was from Lord Mountclere, who wrote on the subject of calling to see her, suggesting a day in the following week.  ‘Now, Picotee,’ she continued, ’we shall have to receive him, and make the most of him, for I have altered my plans since I was last in Knollsea.’