"I don't see any such implication in it," his father angrily retorted. "Your theory would form an excuse for the scoundrelism of every scoundrel unhung. Where is the cure of the social body to begin if it doesn't begin at home, with every man in it? I tell you, it would be a very good thing for Northwick, and every rogue like him, if he could be made serve his term in State's prison." The controversy raged a long time without departing from these lines of argument on either side. Mrs. Hilary listened with the impatience women feel at every absence from the personal ground, the only ground of reality. When Matt had got so far from it as to be saying to his father, "Then I understand you to maintain that if A is properly punished for his sins, B will practice virtue in the same circumstances and under the same temptations that were too much for A," his mother tried to break in upon them. She did not know much about the metaphysical rights and wrongs of the question; she only felt that Matt was getting his father, who loved him so proudly and indulgently, into a corner, and she saw that this was unseemly. Besides, when anything wrong happens, a woman always wants some one punished; some woman, first, or then some other woman's men kindred. Every woman is a conservative in this, and Mrs. Hilary made up her mind to stop the talk between her son and husband, because she felt Matt to be doubly wrong. But when she spoke, her husband roared at her, "Don't interrupt, Sarah!" and then he roared at Matt, "I tell you that the individual is not concerned in the matter! I tell you that it is the interest, the necessity of the community to punish A for his sins without regard to B, and for my part, I shall leave no stone unturned till we have found Northwick, dead or alive; and if he is alive, I shall spare no effort to have him brought to trial, conviction and punishment." He shouted these words out, and thumped the breakfast table so that the spoons clattered in the cups, and Mrs. Hilary could hardly hear what Patrick was saying just inside the door. "To see Mr. Hilary? A lady? Did she send her card?" "She wouldn't give her name, ma'am; she said she didn't wish to, ma'am. She wished to see Mr. Hilary just a moment in the reception-room." Hilary was leaning forward to give the table another bang with his fist, but his wife succeeded in stopping him, with a repetition of Patrick's message. "I won't see her," he answered. "It's probably a woman reporter. They're in our very bread trough. I tell you," he went on to Matt, "there are claims upon you as a citizen, as a social factor, which annul all your sentimental obligations to B as a brother. God bless my soul! Isn't C a brother, too, and all the rest of the alphabet? If A robs the other letters, then let B take a lesson from the wholesome fact that A's little game has landed him in jail."