"One moment more, your Majesty--just a moment. I knew all this almost at the time. Mrs. Carey was staying at a country house in one of my parties when she met the leaders of the noble attempt. It was she who bore to Bagshaw the written evidence upon which Sir John Dacre was shot, and the others condemned to prison. Think but for one moment, your Majesty, the day might still perhaps have been gained at Aldershot, but for one thing--the King did not appear. Consider, sir. Who was it who prevented your Majesty from going to Aldershot that day?" Jawkins heard the King mutter a curse to himself. He hastened to complete his victory, and pulling out a sealed document, unrolled it, and handed it to the King. It was the reappointment, signed by Bagshaw, of Oswald Carey to the Stamp and Sealing-Wax Office. "This, your Majesty, was handed to me by President Bagshaw himself, to give to Mrs. Carey, as his private agent." King George looked over it hastily, and then rising, paced nervously up and down the room. Jawkins kept silence. After some minutes the King stopped in his walk. "Well--if this be true--Mrs. Carey is an agreeable woman. Suppose I chose, without trusting her, to permit her company--" The King interrupted himself for a moment, as he caught Jawkins's eye. Then he resumed his walk hastily. "Yes, yes," he concluded, "I suppose you are right." Jawkins looked carefully around the room, and then continued in a lower voice, "Does your Majesty know--what they say at court--that Mrs. Carey wishes to be the King's--" George stopped him with a look. "Yes, yes--I know all that." "The American divorce laws are very lax, they say," Jawkins went on, "and if the King were to marry her--" "Marry her!" thundered the King; "God, man, what do you mean?" "If I proved to your Majesty that such was her aim?" "She should leave the court this instant." "Will your Majesty permit me to send for her?" Jawkins rang the bell for a messenger. While this scene was going on between Jawkins and the King, the fair subject of their discussion was differently engaged. She, too, had passed a sleepless night. The sight of Geoffrey Ripon again had won upon her strangely, and his unworldly speech had struck some chord in the depths of her own heart now long unused. There is no greater error than to suppose the evil beings of this world all one consistent evil--that would be to be perfect, as Lucifer, the father of lies, alone is perfect. Every life is but a sum of actions, and in every action the good and evil motives are most nicely balanced at the best. A slight preponderance of evil or even some exaggerated habit of mind--a little over-development of pride, of ambition, of passion, a too accented doubt and an overcold analysis--suffices to throw the decision on the wrong side of every case, so that the outward life appears, perhaps, one consistent darkness and wrong. But no one knows how near at every step the noble impulse came to winning.