"Well, if you must know, Mrs. Munger, I mean that you ought to have remembered Mr. Putney's infirmity, and that it was cruel to put temptation in his way. Everybody knows that he can't resist it, and that he is making such a hard fight to keep out of it. And then, if you press me for an opinion, I must say that you were not justifiable in asking Mr. Peck to take part in a social entertainment when we had explicitly dropped that part of the affair."

Mrs. Munger had not pressed Annie for an opinion on this point at all; but in their interest in it they both ignored the fact. Mrs. Munger tacitly admitted her position in retorting, "He needn't have stayed."

"You made him stay--you remember how--and he couldn't have got away without being rude."

"And you think he wasn't rude to scold me before my guests?"

"He told you the truth. He didn't wish to say anything, but you forced him to speak, just as you have forced me."

"Forced _you_? Miss Kilburn!"

"Yes. I don't at all agree with Mr. Peck in many things, but he is a good man, and last night he spoke the truth. I shouldn't be speaking it if I didn't tell you I thought so."

"Very well, then," said Mrs. Munger, rising.

"After this you can't expect me to have anything to do with the Social Union; you couldn't _wish_ me to, if that's your opinion of my character."

"I haven't expressed any opinion of your character, Mrs. Munger, if you'll remember, please; and as for the Social Union, I shall have nothing further to do with it myself."

Annie drew herself up a little higher, and silently waited for her visitor to go.

But Mrs. Munger remained.

"I don't believe Mrs. Putney herself would say what you have said," she remarked, after an embarra.s.sing moment. "If it were really so I should be willing to make any reparation--to acknowledge it. Will you go with me to Mrs. Putney's? I have my phaeton here, and--"

"I shouldn't dream of going to Mrs. Putney's with you."

Mrs. Munger urged, with the effect of invincible argument: "I've been down in the village, and I've talked to a good many about it--some of them hadn't heard of it before--and I must say, Miss Kilburn, that people generally take a very different view of it from what you do. They think that my hospitality has been shamefully abused. Mr. Gates said he should think I would have Mr. Putney arrested. But I don't care for all that. What I wish is to prove to you that I am right; and if I can go with you to call on Mrs. Putney, I shall not care what any one else says. Will you come?"

"Certainly not," cried Annie.

They both stood a moment, and in this moment Dr. Morrell drove up, and dropped his. .h.i.tching-weight beyond Mrs. Munger's phaeton.

As he entered she said: "We will let Dr. Morrell decide. I've been asking Miss Kilburn to go with me to Mrs. Putney's. I think it would be a graceful and proper thing for me to do, to express my sympathy and interest, and to hear what Mrs. Putney really has to say. Don't _you_ think I ought to go to see her, doctor?"

The doctor laughed. "I can't prescribe in matters of social duty. But what do you want to see Mrs. Putney for?"

"What for? Why, doctor, on account of Mr. Putney--what took place last night."

"Yes? What was that?"

"What was _that_? Why, his strange behaviour--his--his intoxication."

"Was he intoxicated? Did you think so?"

"Why, you were there, doctor. Didn't you think so?"

Annie looked at him with as much astonishment as Mrs. Munger.

The doctor laughed again. "You can't always tell when Putney's joking; he's a great joker. Perhaps he was hoaxing."

"Oh doctor, do you think he _could_ have been?" said Mrs. Munger, with clasped hands. "It would make me the happiest woman in the world! I'd forgive him all he's made me suffer. But _you're_ joking _now_, doctor?"

"You can't tell when people are joking. If I'm not, does it follow that I'm really intoxicated?"

"Oh, but that's nonsense, Dr. Morrell. That's mere--what do you call it?--chop logic. But I don't mind it. I grasp at a straw." Mrs. Munger grasped at a straw of the mind, to show how. "But what _do_ you mean?"

"Well, Mrs. Putney wasn't intoxicated last night, but she's not well this morning. I'm afraid she couldn't see you."

"Just as you _say_, doctor," cried Mrs. Munger, with mounting cheerfulness. "I _wish_ I knew just how much you meant, and how little." She moved closer to the doctor, and bent a look of candid fondness upon him. "But I know you're trying to mystify me."

She pursued him with questions which he easily parried, smiling and laughing. At the end she left him to Annie, with adieux that were almost radiant. "Anyhow, I shall take the benefit of the doubt, and if Mr. Putney was hoaxing, I shall not give myself away. _Do_ find out what he means, Miss Kilburn, won't you?" She took hold of Annie's unoffered hand, and pressed it in a double leathern grasp, and ran out of the room with a lightness of spirit which her physical bulk imperfectly expressed.

XX.

"Well?" said Annie, to the change which came over Morrell's face when Mrs.

Munger was gone.

"Oh, it's a miserable business! He must go on now to the end of his debauch. He's got past doing any mischief, I'm thankful to say. But I had hoped to tide him over a while longer, and now that fool has spoiled everything. Well!"

Annie's heart warmed to his vexation, and she postponed another emotion.

"Yes, she _is_ a fool. I wish you had qualified the term, doctor."

They looked at each other solemnly, and then laughed. "It won't do for a physician to swear," said Morrell. "I wish you'd give me a cup of coffee.

I've been up all night."

"With Ralph?"

"With Putney."

"You shall have it instantly; that is, as instantly as Mrs. Bolton can kindle up a fire and make it." She went out to the kitchen, and gave the order with an imperiousness which she softened in Dr. Morrell's interest by explaining rather fully to Mrs. Bolton.

When she came back she wanted to talk seriously, tragically, about Putney.

But the doctor would not. He said that it paid to sit up with Putney, drunk or sober, and hear him go on. He repeated some things Putney said about Mr.

Peck, about Gerrish, about Mrs. Munger.

"But why did you try to put her off in that way--to make her believe he wasn't intoxicated?" asked Annie, venting her postponed emotion, which was of disapproval.

"I don't know. It came into my head. But she knows better."

"It was rather cruel; not that she deserves any mercy. She caught so at the idea."

"Oh yes, I saw that. She'll humbug herself with it, and you'll see that before night there'll be two theories of Putney's escapade. I think the last will be the popular one. It will jump with the general opinion of Putney's ability to carry anything out. And Mrs. Munger will do all she can to support it."

Mrs. Bolton brought in the coffee-pot, and Annie hesitated a moment, with her hand on it, before pouring out a cup.