“Mrs. Silt,” replied Herbert, who had seen the handwriting. “I trust she does not want to pay us a visit this term, with the examinations impending and all the machinery at full pressure. Though, Rickie, you will have to accept the Jacksons’ invitation.” “I cannot possibly go. I have been too rude; with Widdrington we always meet here. I’ll stop with the boys—” His voice caught suddenly. He had opened Mrs. Silt’s letter. “The Silts are not ill, I hope?” “No. But, I say,”—he looked at his wife,—“I do think this is going too far. Really, Agnes.” “What has happened?” “It is going too far,” he repeated. He was nerving himself for another battle. “I cannot stand this sort of thing. There are limits.” He laid the letter down. It was Herbert who picked it up, and read: “Aunt Emily has just written to us. We are so glad that her troubles are over, in spite of the expense. It never does to live apart from one’s own relatives so much as she has done up to now. He goes next Saturday to Canada. What you told her about him just turned the scale. She has asked us—” “No, it’s too much,” he interrupted. “What I told her—told her about him—no, I will have it out at last. Agnes!” “Yes?” said his wife, raising her eyes from Mrs. Jackson’s formal invitation. “It’s you—it’s you. I never mentioned him to her. Why, I’ve never seen her or written to her since. I accuse you.” Then Herbert overbore him, and he collapsed. He was asked what he meant. Why was he so excited? Of what did he accuse his wife. Each time he spoke more feebly, and before long the brother and sister were laughing at him. He felt bewildered, like a boy who knows that he is right but cannot put his case correctly. He repeated, “I’ve never mentioned him to her. It’s a libel. Never in my life.” And they cried, “My dear Rickie, what an absurd fuss!” Then his brain cleared. His eye fell on the letter that his wife had received from his aunt, and he reopened the battle. “Agnes, give me that letter, if you please.” “Mrs. Jackson’s?” “My aunt’s.” She put her hand on it, and looked at him doubtfully. She saw that she had failed to bully him. “My aunt’s letter,” he repeated, rising to his feet and bending over the table towards her. “Why, dear?” “Yes, why indeed?” echoed Herbert. He too had bullied Rickie, but from a purer motive: he had tried to stamp out a dissension between husband and wife. It was not the first time he had intervened. “The letter. For this reason: it will show me what you have done. I believe you have ruined Stephen. You have worked at it for two years. You have put words into my mouth to ‘turn the scale’ against him. He goes to Canada—and all the world thinks it is owing to me. As I said before—I advise you to stop smiling—you have gone a little too far.”