Before noon father and son had met in Saltire garden, under the cedar-tree at the end of the long lawn. They had gripped hands like men, and now paced shoulder to shoulder over the grass, talking together frankly and without restraint. The great trouble that had fallen upon both seemed to have strangled pride and to have broken down that barrier that had always stood between them. John Strong’s face was strangely altered. He seemed younger by some years, and he no longer stooped. “Gabriel,” he said, bluntly, “whatever the past has brought us, let it be granted that I was the greater fool.” “Not so, father,” retorted the son. But even in the quaint thoroughness of his self-abasement, the elder man’s obstinacy played its part. “Hang argument,” he said; “the facts are plain. No man likes owning that he was wrong, and I, sir, am no exception. But you struck for a principle, I for a prejudice. There is the truth in a nutshell.” But Gabriel was not convinced. “The fault was in measure mine,” he said, “even because I did not trust you as a son should.” Under the trees, over the green grass below the banks of burning flowers, they saw Joan and Judith walking hand-in-hand. A calm light played upon Gabriel’s face; a smile flickered over John Strong’s stubborn mouth. “Confound these women!” he said; “how they shame us.” “True, sir, I have learned as much.” “My own daughter has taught me a lesson.” “And Joan has made a man of me.” They met together under the cedar, Joan and Gabriel, Judith and her father. It seemed that they had communion in that hour and that the same spirit inspired them all. John Strong reached out his hands to Judith and the other two. “Come, lassies and lads,” he said, with a grim yet merry light in his gray eyes, “take hands and let us make our vow.” “What shall we vow?” asked Judith, holding her father’s arm. “To stand against slander.” “Against slander,” said they all. “Till death us do part.” XLVII WITH strange swiftness tidings of a fellow’s misfortune are carried by the wind and wafted into every willing ear. People are the more quick to receive the news of another’s failure in preference to some small glory that may have blessed some one among them. Save to the generous few, the follies of humanity fall like libations poured before the eternal ego. A man’s so-called friends are his most subtle enemies, for they stand ever ready to stab him, claiming hypocritical candor in justification of the deed. The world loves disaster even that it may point the obvious moral, smite its self-righteous bosom and exclaim, “God, I thank thee that I am no fool.”