He looked as if he certainly did not know what dulness was, Diana thought. She listened, much amused. "But you think it is wrong to dance, don't you?" Gertrude went on. "'Better not' is wrong to a Christian," he replied. "It must be dreadful to be a Christian!" "Because--?" he said, with a quiet and good-humoured glance and tone of inquiry. "O, because it is slavery. So many things you cannot do, and dresses you cannot wear." "By what rule?" Mr. Masters asked. "O, people think you are dreadful if you do those things; the Church, and all that. So I think it is a great deal better to keep out of it, and make no pretensions." "Better to keep out of what? let me understand," said the minister. "You are getting my ideas in a very involved state." "No, I am not! I say, it is better to make no profession." "Better than what? What is the alternative?" "O, you know. Now you are catechizing me. It is better to make no profession, than to make it and not live up to it." "I understand. That is to say, it is wicked to pay your debts with counterfeit notes, so it is better not to pay them at all." "Nonsense, Basil! I am not talking of paying debts." "But I am." "What have debts got to do with it?" "I beg your pardon. I understood you to declare your disapprobation of false money, and your preference for another sort of dishonesty." "Dishonest, Basil! there is no dishonesty." "By what name do you call it?" He was speaking gravely, though with a surface pleasantry; both gravity and pleasantry were of a very winning kind. Diana looked on and listened, much interested, as well as amused; Gertrude puzzled and impatient, though unable to resist the attraction. She hesitated, and surveyed him. "There can't be dishonesty unless where one owes something." "Precisely"--he said, glancing at her. His hands were busy at the time with a supple twig he had cut from one of the trees, which he was trimming of its leaves and buds. "What do I owe?" said the beauty, throwing her tresses of hair off from her shoulders. He waited a bit, the one lady looking defiant, the other curious; and then he said, with a sort of gentle simplicity that was at the same time uncompromising, "'The Lord hath made all things for himself.'" Gertrude's foot patted the turf; after a minute she answered, "Of course you say that because you are a clergyman." "No, I don't. I am stating a fact, which I thought it likely you had forgotten." Gertrude stood up, as if she had got enough of the conversation. Diana wished for another word. "It is a fact," she said; "but what have we to do with it?" "Only to let the Lord have his own," said the minister with a full look at her. "How do you mean, Mr. Masters? I don't understand." Gertrude was marching over the grass, leading to the house. The other two followed. "When you have contrived and made a thing, you reckon it is your own, don't you? and when you have bought something, you think it is at your disposal?"