Mr. Coventry remained quiet for some days, by which means he pacified Grace's terrors.
On the fourth day Mr. Beresford called at Woodbine Villa, and Grace received him, he being the curate of the parish.
He spoke to her in a sympathetic tone, which let her know at once he was partly in the secret. He said he had just visited a very guilty, but penitent man; that we all need forgiveness, and that a woman, once married, has no chance of happiness but with her husband.
Grace maintained a dead silence, only her eye began to glitter.
Mr. Beresford, who had learned to watch the countenance of all those he spoke to changed his tone immediately, from a spiritual to a secular adviser.
“If I were you,” said he, in rather an offhand way, “I would either forgive this man the sin into which his love has betrayed him, or I would try to get a divorce. This would cost money: but, if you don't mind expense, I think I could suggest a way—”
Grace interrupted him. “From whom did you learn my misery, and his villainy? I let you in, because I thought you came from God; but you come from a villain. Go back, sir, and say that an angel, sent by him, becomes a devil in my eyes.” And she rang the bell with a look that spoke volumes.
Mr. Beresford bowed, smiled bitterly, and went back to Coventry, with whom he had a curious interview, that ended in Coventry lending him two hundred pounds on his personal security. To dispose of Mr. Beresford for the present I will add that, soon after this, his zeal for the poor subjected him to an affront. He was a man of soup-kitchens and subscriptions. One of the old fogies, who disliked him, wrote letters to The Liberal, and demanded an account of his receipts and expenditure in these worthy objects, and repeated the demand with a pertinacity that implied suspicion. Then Mr. Beresford called upon Dr. Fynes, and showed him the letters, and confessed to him that he never kept any accounts, either of public or private expenditure. “I can construe Apollonius Rhodius—with your assistance, sir,” said he, “but I never could add up pounds, shillings, and pence; far less divide them except amongst the afflicted.” “Take no notice of the cads,” said Dr. Fynes. But Beresford represented meekly that a clergyman's value and usefulness were gone when once a slur was thrown upon him. Then Dr. Fynes gave him high testimonials, and they parted with mutual regret.
It took Grace a day to get over her interview with Mr. Beresford; and when with Jael's help she was calm again, she received a letter from Coventry, indited in tones of the deepest penitence, but reminding her that he had offered her his life, had made no resistance when she offered to take it, and never would.
There was nothing in the letter that irritated her, but she saw in it an attempt to open a correspondence. She wrote back: