It was symptomatic that there had been some time ago a split among the chapel people, with which Oliver Constable was mixed up. In general these splits were tokens of a disease peculiar to dissenting bodies, in which nobody outside dreamt of taking any interest. For that matter, nobody was likely to hear of the divisions unless from servants and tradespeople. But for Oliver Constable, who ought to have been the chief pillar of the chapel, to be in bad odour with the members was too ominous to be passed over. Here was the end of foolish aspirations, of eccentricity, and not doing at Rome as the Romans did, but aiming at being hero or saint or a mixture of both. So Apollo and Caliban by turns had merged into Vulcan, who had been stealing very vulgar and unhallowed fire indeed when he met his fit punishment. Mrs. Hilliard was sorry for Fan—yes, she could spare sincere pity for Fan Constable at last. Mrs. Hilliard told her tale with a curious mixture of regret and annoyance—since she had chosen to count kindred with the Constables—and of lurking satisfaction, because what she had said of Oliver’s high faluting, what she had prophesied as sure to follow transcendental ambition, had been borne out. She had called Oliver half Apollo half Caliban, she herself was half a good-natured woman, half a mocking-cynic. Mrs. Hilliard was stopped by Catherine. The cold statue became strangely warm, and instinct with life and emotion—red hot, actually gasping for breath in her indignation. ‘I wonder at you, Louisa,’ panted Catherine, ‘to listen to such wicked slander, to give credence to it for a moment, to put yourself on an equality with its fabricators, helping in its circulation. Oliver Constable is a good man, true as steel, pure as honesty itself, kind as a brother, though he may waste his fine qualities. I will pledge myself for his perfect innocence of anything so despicable and loathsome as hypocrisy—even if he were weak enough to be vicious and not as he is, too strong in his virtue to care for appearances.’ ‘He does not lack an enthusiastic champion,’ observed Mrs. Hilliard, letting the corners of her mouth droop. ‘Take care, my dear, you are not infallible in your convictions any more than the gentleman is in his conduct. The passion for being _outré_ seems infectious. Ah! blessed are they who expect nothing, for they shall not be disappointed. I have not been so wise as to be without expectation, though I have had my misgivings. Now I must confess, in spite of your looking daggers at me, I am disappointed in Oliver Constable. The sequel threatens to exceed so tremendously what I bargained for. I only anticipated a ludicrous collapse; I did not go in for a dismal wreck—at which I shall not be able to laugh, therefore you need not be angry with me,’ complained Mrs. Hilliard with a half-comical air of injury.