“I see. And you?” “Well, you have sometimes thought I was a little rash.” “A little? Did I think it was a little?” “Well, a good deal. But it was all nothing to what I've been since Lemuel came. I used to keep some slight check upon myself for Sibyl's sake; but I don't now. I know that Lemuel is there to temper, to delay, to modify the effect of every impulse, and so I am all impulse now. And I've quite ceased to rule my temper. I know that Lemuel has self-control enough for all the tempers in the house, and so I feel perfectly calm in my wildest transports of fury.” “I understand,” said Sewell. “And does Sibyl permit herself a similar excess in her fancies and ambitions?” “Quite,” said Miss Vane. “I don't know that she consciously relies upon Lemuel to supplement her, any more than Jane does; but she must be unconsciously aware that no extravagance of hers can be dangerous while Lemuel is in the house.” “Unconsciously aware is good. She hasn't got tired of reforming him yet?” “I don't know. I sometimes think she wishes he had gone a little farther in crime. Then his reformation would be more obvious.” “Yes; I can appreciate that. Does she still look after his art and literature?” “That phase has changed a little. She thinks now that he ought to be stimulated, if anything--that he ought to read George Eliot. She's put _Middlemarch_ and _Romola_ on his shelf. She says that he looks like Tito Malemma.” Sewell rose. “Well, I don't see but what your supplement is a very demoralising element. I shall never dare to tell Mrs. Sewell what you've said.” “Oh, she knows it,” cried Miss Vane. “We've agreed that you will counteract any temptation that Lemuel may feel to abuse his advantages by the ferociously self-denying sermons you preach at him every Sunday.” “Do I preach at him? Do you notice it?” asked Sewell nervously. “Notice it?” laughed Miss Vane. “I should think your whole congregation would notice it. You seem to look at nobody else.” “I know it! Since he began to come, I can't keep my eyes off him. I do deliver my sermons at him. I believe I write them at him! He has an eye of terrible and exacting truth. I feel myself on trial before him. He holds me up to a standard of sincerity that is killing me. Mrs. Sewell was bad enough; I was reasonably bad myself; but this! Couldn't you keep him away? Do you think it's exactly decorous to let your man-servant occupy a seat in your family pew? How do you suppose it looks to the Supreme Being?” Miss Vane was convulsed. “I had precisely those misgivings! But Lemuel hadn't. He asked me what the number of our pew was, and I hadn't the heart--or else I hadn't the face--to tell him he mustn't sit in it. How could I? Do you think it's so very scandalous?” “I don't know,” said Sewell. “It may lead to great abuses. If we tacitly confess ourselves equal in the sight of God, how much better are we than the Roman Catholics?” Miss Vane could not suffer these ironies to go on.