And now she heard that the man she loved had been keeping that thing called "a mistress"--housing her in luxury, visiting her day after day, not very greatly troubling himself whether the fact remained secret or became known. Then dates were mentioned; and she was given to know how those visits had still gone on while her lover had been offering her the devotion of his heart. It was there, after his recent accident, that he had gone to be nursed. The Archbishop was extremely well informed, and he told nothing which he did not absolutely believe to be true. And now at last all the advantage was on his side, for ignorance left her almost without defense; with no sense of proportion she stood looking out into a non-dimensional world. Dimly her mind made a struggle to escape. "But what, what does it mean?" she asked. "There must be some reason for it. Is it a kind of disease?" "A corrupt nature," said her father solemnly; "these are what the Church calls in her teaching 'the sins of the flesh.'" She shuddered, for to her by religious training "flesh" had come to have a dreadful sound. In her spiritual world she pictured it as a shop hung with butcher's meat; yet why it was dreadful she did not know. "Tell me," she murmured with pained speech, still trying for a way out, "it isn't--natural, is it?" "That doctrine is preached by some," said her father; "Christianity forbids any such view." "He said," she went on, "he said this, when he first asked me to marry him: 'I have done some natural things which you would hold to be wrong. I have loved,' he said, 'for mere comfort, not for honor or life.' He asked me if I understood; I said 'Yes.' 'That is my confession,' he said. 'I have been,' he said, 'no better than others; I hope not worse.' And that was all. I thought he meant that he had been selfish and worldly. Is that other thing what he really meant?" "No doubt." "But he _told_ me," she said, and looked at him with a forlorn hope. "It was the best thing that he could do for himself; no doubt he guessed that eventually you would come to know." She stood thinking back into the past. "After he had told, he kissed me," she said; "he had never done that before." Her lips trembled and the tears ran down her face. "You know enough now, my dear. That will not happen again." "I still love him," she said, as though confessing to shame. The Archbishop had sufficient wisdom to accept the statement without protest. "It would be hard for you to do otherwise," he said. "The heart cannot change all at once." "I believed that with him I could do good." "Can you believe that now?" "I don't know." "That sort of life enters the blood," said her father, "taints it, makes evil that which would otherwise be holy." "You mean----?" "I speak of marriage; the drawing together of two into one." "It still is marriage." "Its mystery has been profaned. Marriage then, coming after, may be only a reminiscence of sin."