"Little old jug?" Sue reflected, but could not remember. And she wondered somewhat. What could "a little old jug" have to do with the present conversation? "The one with the French soldier's motto. It used to be on the anteroom mantelpiece at Boldero. Oh, you must remember it, Sue." "We had so much china, dear----" "But this was the one I asked you to give me for my own--however, listen. The motto was:-- "Mon ame a Dieu, Ma vie au Roi, Mon coeur aux Dames, L'honneur pour moi." "Paul noticed it one day, and turned round and said, 'That's splendid,'--and read it again. That was when he first came. And afterwards, when things were getting very bad, I came upon him standing in front of the mantelpiece, staring at the jug. I rather liked it myself, but I didn't see it as he did, for on that dreadful day," she looked down, even when it was only Sue, she looked down--"when Paul saved me from myself----" "When you were too ill to know what you were doing, darling." "He looked at me and said with a sort of smile, '_L'honneur pour moi_.' Sue?" Sue looked attention. "You know how poor Maud bored us--I mean how she insisted on Paul's religion as if it were something which gave him a sort of _cachet_--something quite over _our_ heads?--and how father--oh, Sue, I must say it--do you remember how father once shut her up by declaring that Paul was too much of a gentleman to introduce unpleasant subjects? It was only father's way, you know. He didn't mean any harm, and I do think, don't you, that father was changed a little, that he was different those last few weeks? He said to me once: 'There's more in it than you think'. Anyway, Sue, he did like and admire Paul." "Yes--yes, he did." "Now I want to say something," Leo changed the subject, which each felt to be a sad one. "Sue, what really--what I shall never forget, is, that when the worst moment of all came, when Paul and I were together, all alone, and I was ready--oh, I _was_ ready to fall into his arms if he had held out his little finger--he didn't hold it. He stood there like a statue. And I know, I _know_ what held him back. If all the world had called Paul a good man, and he had preached goodness from morning to night, it wouldn't have had the least effect, but when he said '_L'honneur pour moi_'"--her tears overflowed, and Sue wept likewise.... They often wondered how much and how little had been suspected by Maud, inducing her own line of action. In the light of her subsequent attitude it seemed more than probable that she had either learnt or divined that all was not as it appeared, but so cleverly had she kept up a show of being in good spirits up to the close of the day which was to Leo like the day of judgment, that nothing could be certain.