“It is mos’ difficult—like some philosophy in a big book. I make him bad, but I do not make him bad, yet he is bad bicause of me....” Her eyes began to flash as she arose in Kendall’s defense. “It is not true. What you say is ver’ bad and wicked. For he is nevair bad.... As for me, I do not theenk I am bad. No. I do not theenk _le bon Dieu_ believes I am bad. You yourself, mademoiselle, have seen me and speak weeth me. Do you theenk I am bad?” “No, dear. I believe you are good.... I mean it. From the bottom of my heart, I believe you are good.” “It is well. Then, can one take something bad from one who is good? See! To be bad is to offend the good God. Have I offended the good God who smiles when there is a great love? I do not theenk. Have I made Monsieur Ken to offend the good God?... I should not be happy as I am if it were so.... Have I made him to do a wickedness? Am I a woman of that sort? It is not true. All I have desire is for him to be good and to be ver’ happy.... That is not a sin, and it does not make a sin for him.... And you would not marry him even though you love him.... Mademoiselle, that is not a good love, not such a love as make the good God to smile.... It is a wickedness to love so....” “My dear—” “No.... Let me speak. Suppose thees Monsieur Ware have love me and marry me—and I am no more. I am dead. Then you would not marry him?” “That is different altogether. There would be no reason why I shouldn’t marry him then.” “But I tell you, it is the same. Behol’! he loves me so ver’ much, and one day he does not love me bicause the war is done and he mus’ go home, and it is not possible for him to carry me weeth him.... The theeng is ended. It is as if I were dead—as I should desire it to be. The love was the same as if I have marry him.... He would then nevair be weeth me any more. I would be as if I were not.... And he would have taken no harm.... To say that he would be harmed is to say that to love a man more than any other theeng in the worl’ is to harm him, and to say that, mademoiselle, is _impie—blasphématoire_—to say a theeng which is an insult to God.... No!... No!... You make a wrong.... Because he have love’ then he is better—not more wicked.... I say to you, mademoiselle, that the love like I have for Monsieur Ware makes to keep him from a sin. I know.” Maude’s eyes were not dry. She was listening to a thing that rang with truth and with goodness. She saw what she had never been able to perceive before, and it showed her that Kendall Ware could take no harm from Andree, let their relations be what they might, for Andree was good, with a simplicity and a faith and a purity greater and better than any she had ever known. American as she was, reared upon the traditions of Plymouth Rock, which are as unbending as the laws of the Medes and Persians, she perceived the truth, saw that to judge is a power withheld from mortals and jealously guarded by God....