"What is the subject?" "I have not thought of a title yet; but you may call it 'Universal Charity,' or (better perhaps) 'The Charity due to wicked persons.'" "You mean Hetty?" She limped close to him. "Hetty may have done wickedly, but she is _not_ a wicked person, as you might have discovered had you let Universal Charity alone and practised it in particular, for once, by going to visit her. It is now close on four months that you and Charles have been home, and from here to Lincoln is no such great distance." "You are a sturdy champion," he answered, eyeing her up and down. "As a matter of fact you are right, though you assert it rashly. How are you sure that I have not visited Hetty, seeing that three times I have been absent from home and for some days together?" Molly winced. "The worse reproach to all of us, that her only champion was the weakling whom you all scorn! You do not understand weakness, Jack. As for my knowing that you had not visited her, Johnny Whitelamb took his holiday a fortnight ago and trudged to Lincoln to see her. She is living behind a dingy little shop with her husband, and his horrible old father, who drinks whatever he can filch from the till. They wink at it so long as he does not go too far; but William is trying to find him lodgings at Louth, which was his old home, and hopes to sell up the business and move to London with Hetty, to try his fortune. Uncle Matthew has written to her, and will help them to move, I believe. And there was a baby coming, but mercifully something went wrong, poor mite! All this news she sent by Johnny, who reports that she is brave and cheerful and as beautiful as ever--more beautiful than ever, he said--but she talked long of you and Charles, and is said to have seen neither of you." "So Whitelamb is in the conspiracy? Since you have so much of his confidence, you might warn him to be careful. Doubts of our father's wisdom must unsettle him woefully. I do not ask to join the alliance, but it may please you to know that in my belief Hetty has been treated too fiercely for her deserts, and in my sermon I intend to hint at this pretty plainly." Molly stared. "Dear Jack, it--it is good to have you on our side. But what good can a sermon do?" "Not much, I fear. Still a testimony is a testimony." "But the folks will know you are speaking of her." "I mean them to." "But--but--" Molly cast about, bewildered. "I am venturing something," John interrupted coldly, "by testifying against my father. It is not over-pleasant to stand up and admit that in our own family we have sinned against Christ's injunction to judge not." "I should think not, indeed!" "Then you might reasonably show a little more pleasure at finding me prepared, to that extent, to take your side." Molly gasped. His misunderstanding seemed to her too colossal to be coped with. "It will be a public reproach to father," she managed to say.