The knowledge of the anxiety of his sisters, the dear peaceful women who worshipped him as the paragon of all the excellencies, was a perpetual pain. He wrote to them reassuringly, minimised the danger, expatiated upon the point of honour, and, knowing their sensitive spot, brought forward, with some twinges of self-contempt, the family pride. Death before dishonour--but death a remote contingency; thus could his message be summarised. Old Geoffrey Colman, who had been illustrating the proverb that threatened men live long, also wrote on the subject of the family honour. To save it, he was willing to buy up the security--the history of the reversion was the property of a million wagging tongues. But this Hugh peremptorily declined. The debt now lay between himself and Minna. There was the pound of flesh, but not a drop of blood. Sacred should be the letter of the law. The days passed, he scarce knew how, eventless, dull, yet filled with cravings for the vivid life of action that had been first his inheritance and then his prize. Their inactivity weighed upon him. He envied his fellow-prisoners, upon whom sentence had been passed and who had their daily tasks to execute. Chapel, exercise, meals, reading, sleep--his sole avocations. Now and then came Harroway and with him Charles Gardiner, Q.C., his friend and counsel. Other visitors he refused to receive. Sensitive and pliant as was his nature, yet it was traversed by a seam of flint that rendered it self-sufficing. He was one of those men, capable of chivalrous impulse and lasting loyalty, who nevertheless are unable to reveal themselves entirely to dearest friend or belovedest woman; who reserve, as a jealous right, a portion of themselves for their own exclusive possession. Not only were his lips of necessity closed on this matter, but also, in the battle against circumstances which he had undertaken to fight single-handed, too vivid expression of sympathy was distasteful. His sisters would have clung about his neck and unmanned him. Irene, who would have understood his reticence, he could not receive without Gerard. And his pride shrank from the idea of meeting even Irene. The moment’s speech and hand-clasp after the trial had been sufficient to convince him of her trust in his innocence. But the thrilling pity and admiration in her eyes, he could not bear. Already she had written: “You are shielding a woman’s honour at the risk of your life; but what woman’s trumpery honour is worth such chivalry?” And he had written back in grim truthfulness: “It is no woman’s honour that I am protecting, and my attitude is far from heroic.” But he knew her well enough to realise that she would not believe his disclaimer. To destroy her feminine conception of his character was impossible; but he could not bear to masquerade in her presence in the guise of a hero.