“If she had only sent her husband instead of coming herself. One can talk to a man.” Peter might have been talking to himself. He had risen and now was walking about the room on soft-balled feet like a captive panther. “You don’t know our religion, our creed. We have the true Christian spirit and desire to help others. The sensual cannot be made the mouthpiece of the spiritual. Sensuality palsies the right hand and causes the left to let go its divine grasp. That is why I interfere, for your own good as we are enjoined. Uncleanliness must lead to the body’s hurt, in so far as it can be hurt. But mind and matter being one, what hurts the one will hurt the other.” “You can cut the cackle and come to the horses,” Peter interrupted rudely. He had summed up the situation and thought he might control it. To him it was obvious the woman was a common blackmailer, although she had formulated no terms. “You are making a great deal of the fact that Mr. Stanton has been down here two or three times. I suppose you know he is Mrs. Capel’s publisher.” “Do not interfere, young man. You are a member of a mendacious profession. I am not here to speak to you. I know Gabriel Stanton slept in the house,” she said to Margaret. “What then? Show us your foul mind, if you dare.” “There is no mind....” “Oh! damn your jargon. What have you come here for? What do you want?” He stopped opposite to her in his restless walking. There shot a gleam of avarice into her dull eye. “Is he your mouthpiece?” she asked Margaret, who nodded her assent. “I want nothing for myself.” “For whom, then?” “The labourer is worthy of his hire.... Our Church....” “You call it a church, do you? And you are short of cash. There are not enough silly women, half-witted men. You want money....” “For the promulgation of our tenets.” She interrupted. “Yes, we need money for that, for the regeneration of the world.” “And to keep your own house going.” “Your insults do not touch me. I am uplifted from them. Nothing touches the true believer.” Margaret called him over to her and whispered: “Find out whether James knows anything of this or whether she is acting on her own; what she really wants. I can’t talk to her.” Mrs. Roope went on talking and spluttering out texts. “Cannot you see that Mrs. Capel is ill?” he said angrily. The Christian Healer was quick to take the opening he gave her. “Sickness is a growth of error, springing from man’s ignorance of Christian Science.” “Oh! more rot—rot—rot, _rot_! Shut it! What we want to know is if there is any one in this but yourself. We don’t admit a word of truth in your allegations. They are lies, and we have no doubt you know they are lies.” “Mrs. Capel will make her own deductions. What have you to do with it, young man?” “I’ll tell you what I have to do with it. I am here to protect this lady.” “Mr. Capel and his lawyer will understand.” “That isn’t what you came down here to say.”