“I admire your spirit,” said Hubert. “Dr. Johnson liked a good hater; I like a good lover. On the whole, it’s more rarely found. But aren’t you the least bit Quixotic, with your terrible loyalty? No one denies that Roger is the best of the best of the best! But do what you please, Nora, you cannot make virtue entertaining. As a clergyman, you know, I have had to try it. But it’s no use; there’s a fatal family likeness between goodness and dulness. Of course you are fond of Roger. So am I, so is every one in his heart of hearts. But what are we to do about it? The kindest thing is to leave him alone. His virtues are his own affair. You describe him perfectly when you say that everything in the house here sings his praise,—already, before he has been here ten days! The chairs are all straight, the pictures are admirably hung, the locks are oiled, the winter fuel is stocked, the bills are paid! Look at the tidies pinned on the chairs. I will warrant you he pinned them with his own hands. Such is Roger! Such virtues, in a household, are priceless. He ought never to marry; his wife would die for want of occupation. What society cares for in a man is not his household virtues, but his worldly ones. I am talking now, of course, as a man of the world. Society wants to see things by the large end of the telescope, not by the small. ‘Be as good as you please,’ it says, ‘but unless you are interesting, I’ll none of you!’” “Interesting!” cried Nora, with a rosy flush. “I have seen some very interesting people who have bored me to death. But if people don’t care for Roger, it’s their own loss!” Pausing a moment she fixed Hubert with the searching candor of her gaze. “You are unjust,” she said. This charge was pleasant to the young man’s soul; he would not, for the world, have summarily rebutted it. “Explain, dear cousin,” he said, smiling kindly. “Wherein am I unjust?” It was the first time he had called her cousin; the word made a sweet confusion in her thoughts. But looking at him still while she collected them, “You don’t care to know!” she cried. “Not when you smile so! You are laughing at me, at Roger, at every one!” Clever men had ere this been called dreadfully satirical by pretty women; but never, surely, with just that imperious naïveté. She spoke with a kind of joy in her frankness; the sense of intimacy with the young man had effaced the sense of difference. “The scoffing fiend! That’s a pretty character to give a clergyman!” said Hubert. “Are you, at heart, a clergyman? I have been wondering.” “You have heard me preach.” “Yes, a year ago, when I was a silly little girl. I want to hear you again.”