Mrs. Mavering thought she could see why Morgan suggested to Thaddeus such terms as "primitive," "aboriginal." There was something rugged and rough-hewn evident in the first place, a massiveness of antediluvian bone, such as they dig from the clay banks of rivers. "We are all egotists," was Thaddeus's theory, "but the primary won't do." He is savage and solitary, too direct, too elemental. He jumps to his aim. He does not care, so he gets it, what happens in between. He does not care for minor points. But civilization is a system of minor points. He has no sympathy, cannot move from his footing an inch to take another point of view. Doubtless he will lie and betray, for they are minor points of method, and faith and truth are social products. At least, he will not notice what he may happen incidentally to step on, or what becomes of an opposition after it is sufficiently smashed. "Why," he asked, primitively, "why should I?" But Mrs. Mavering thought all this seemed an airy structure, built on a theory which was very likely a prejudice. Gard was playing something martial, with the shrilling of fifes, the mutter of drums in it, and the measured tramp of feet. He was looking at Helen to see if she knew what he meant, because one liked to look at her, no doubt; it seemed to justify itself; but more particularly because he had fancied of late that her face was a kind of magic mirror, such as enchanters used to raise upon by incantation their pictured prophecies, and that he was become able to summon to it the shadows and counterparts of his moods, and watch the brightening and darkening of himself in reflection. When he would come from the organ-loft, find her with Mrs. Mavering in the dark under the gallery by the stone pillar, and the three go out across the yard to Mrs. Mavering's house, he always found that Helen's interpretations, however wide they might be from his own in point of verbal symbols and form of allegory, followed the mood with accurate detail. Only the mirror tended to add moral judgments, or to substitute the terms, right and wrong, for beautiful and ugly, for harmony and discord, and in that respect appeared to be inaccurate. Still, it enabled him to realize himself with curious vividness. Helen's face was flushed. Presently Gard became absorbed and looked at it no longer. He was trying to get not merely the sound of the marching, the ripple of the flags, and the elation of the crowds, but something about devotion and the spirit of the nation shining like the sun on the faces of its soldiers. Mrs. Mavering, too, turned from Helen, and noticed how thickly Morgan's yellow eyebrows were knit above his eyes, which seemed to have a kind of green glare in them. They were fixed on Helen. A sudden memory shot through Mrs. Mavering's mind like a sharp pain--she shivered. Thaddeus noted it. "Exactly," he murmured to her; "quite so."