Perhaps he did not believe in “goodness” and “badness” any more than his son; but as he would have said: He didn’t know—couldn’t tell; there might be something in it; and why, by an unnecessary expression of disbelief, deprive yourself of possible advantage? Accustomed to spend his holidays among the mountains, though (like a true Forsyte) he had never attempted anything too adventurous or too foolhardy, he had been passionately fond of them. And when the wonderful view (mentioned in Baedeker—“fatiguing but repaying”.—was disclosed to him after the effort of the climb, he had doubtless felt the existence of some great, dignified principle crowning the chaotic strivings, the petty precipices, and ironic little dark chasms of life. This was as near to religion, perhaps, as his practical spirit had ever gone. But it was many years since he had been to the mountains. He had taken June there two seasons running, after his wife died, and had realized bitterly that his walking days were over. To that old mountain—given confidence in a supreme order of things he had long been a stranger. He knew himself to be old, yet he felt young; and this troubled him. It troubled and puzzled him, too, to think that he, who had always been so careful, should be father and grandfather to such as seemed born to disaster. He had nothing to say against Jo—who could say anything against the boy, an amiable chap?—but his position was deplorable, and this business of Jun’s nearly as bad. It seemed like a fatality, and a fatality was one of those things no man of his character could either understand or put up with. In writing to his son he did not really hope that anything would come of it. Since the ball at Roger’s he had seen too clearly how the land lay—he could put two and two together quicker than most men—and, with the example of his own son before his eyes, knew better than any Forsyte of them all that the pale flame singes men’s wings whether they will or no. In the days before Jun’s engagement, when she and Mrs. Soames were always together, he had seen enough of Irene to feel the spell she cast over men. She was not a flirt, not even a coquette—words dear to the heart of his generation, which loved to define things by a good, broad, inadequate word—but she was dangerous. He could not say why. Tell him of a quality innate in some women—a seductive power beyond their own control! He would but answer: “Humbug!” She was dangerous, and there was an end of it. He wanted to close his eyes to that affair. If it was, it was; _he_ did not want to hear any more about it—he only wanted to save Jun’s position and her peace of mind. He still hoped she might once more become a comfort to himself.