“That he sought my acquaintance. It would then be necessary to know something about him, and the readiest question would be--how he had made his money!” Alexa was silent for some time. “Do you think God cares about everything?” she said at length. “Everything,” answered Andrew, and she said no more. Andrew avoided the discussion of moral questions. He regarded the thing as _vermiculate_, and ready to corrupt the obedience. “When you have a thing to do,” he would say, “you will do it right in proportion to your love of right. But do the right, and you will love the right; for by doing it you will see it in a measure as it is, and no one can see the truth as it is without loving it. The more you _talk_ about what is right, or even about the doing of it, the more you are in danger of exemplifying how loosely theory may be allied to practice. Talk without action saps the very will. Something you have to do is waiting undone all the time, and getting more and more undone. The only refuge is _to do_.” To know the thing he ought to do was a matter of import, to do the thing he knew he ought to do was a matter of life and death to Andrew. He never allowed even a cognate question to force itself upon him until he had attended to the thing that demanded doing: it was merest common sense! Alexa had in a manner got over her uneasiness at the report of how George was making his money, and their correspondence was not interrupted. But something, perhaps a movement from the world of spirit coming like the wind, had given her one of those motions to betterment, which, however occasioned, are the throb of the divine pulse in our life, the call of the Father, the pull of home, and the guide thither to such as will obey them. She had in consequence again become doubtful about Crawford, and as to whether she was right in corresponding with him. This led to her talk with Andrew, which, while it made her think less of his intellect, influenced her in a way she neither understood nor even recognized. There are two ways in which one nature may influence another for betterment--the one by strengthening the will, the other by heightening the ideal. Andrew, without even her suspicion of the fact, wrought in the latter way upon Alexa. She grew more uneasy. George was coming home: how was she to receive him? Nowise bound, they were on terms of intimacy: was she to encourage the procession of that intimacy, or to ward attempt at nearer approach? CHAPTER XX. GEORGE AND ANDREW. George returned, and made an early appearance at Potlurg. Dawtie met him in the court. She did not know him, but involuntarily shrunk from him. He frowned. There was a natural repugnance between them; the one was simple, the other double; the one was pure, the other selfish; the one loved her neighbor, the other preyed upon his.