Eddy, red as if her words had been a whip in his face, turned back into the house and shut the door rather violently behind him, as if by the gesture he would shut out all the harsh, coarse judgments of the undiscriminating world. He climbed the stairs to the studio, and found them having tea and discussing pictures, from their own several points of view, not the world’s. It was a rest. Mrs. Crawford, as they drove over the jolting surface of Blackfriars’ Road, said, “Very odd friends your young man has, darling. And what a very unpleasant region they live in. It is just as well for the sake of the carriage wheels that we shall never have to go there again. We can’t, of course, if we are liable to meet people of no reputation there. I’m sure you know nothing about things like that, but I’m sorry to say that Mrs. Le Moine has done things she ought not to have done. One may continue to admire her music, as one may admire the acting of those who lead such unfortunate lives on the stage; but one can’t meet her. Eddy ought to know that. Of course it’s different for him. Men may meet anyone; in fact, I believe they do; and no one thinks the worse of them. But I can’t; still less, of course, you. I don’t suppose your dear mother would like me to tell you about her, so I won’t.” “I know,” said Molly, blushing again and feeling she oughtn’t to. “Eddy told me. He’s a great friend of hers, you see.” “Oh, indeed. Well, girls know everything now-a-days, of course. In fact, everyone knows this; both she and Hugh Datcherd were such well-known people. I don’t say it was so very dreadfully wrong, what they did; and of course Dorothy Datcherd left Hugh in the lurch first--but you wouldn’t have heard of that, no--only it does put Mrs. Le Moine beyond the pale. And, in fact, it is dreadfully wrong to fly in the face of everybody’s principles and social codes; of course it is.” Molly cared nothing for everyone’s principles and social codes; but she knew it was dreadfully wrong, what they had done. She couldn’t even reason it out; couldn’t formulate the real reason why it was wrong; couldn’t see that it was because it was giving rein to individual desire at the expense of the violation of a system which on the whole, however roughly and crudely, made for civilisation, virtue, and intellectual and moral progress; that it was, in short, a step backwards into savagery, a giving up of ground gained. Arnold Denison, more clear-sighted, saw that; Molly, with only her childlike, unphilosophical, but intensely vivid recognition of right and wrong to help her, merely knew it was wrong. From three widely different standpoints those three, Molly, Arnold Denison, Mrs. Crawford, joined in that recognition. Against them stood Eddy, who saw only the right in it, and the stabbing, wounding pity of it....