Jim laughed, and she laughed.
"Well, I don't suppose I could keep on that game for long," said her husband; "but I mean that I'll be awf'ly square, an' footle after you round the town. It's th' sort of thing good husbands do, y' know. Give us a kiss, old girl, an' we'll begin our married life all over again."
Leah obeyed very contentedly, and nestled in Jim's strong arms like an innocent schoolgirl. She felt worn-out and tired, and drowsy from excess of emotion; felt also that here was a much-desired haven for a worried woman. "Dear old Jim!" she sighed, and Jim kissed her again.
The light was dying out of the sunset sky, and the room filled with pale warm shadows. The reconciled pair sat silently on the sofa in the gathering darkness, locked in a close embrace. The remorseful Jim felt that they were prisoners in the same dock, and anxiously paved a certain place with the very best intentions. Leah went to sleep, thanks to a less tender conscience.
To the world these two were the prosperous and happy Duke and Duchess of Pentland; to themselves, a misguided couple driven to do wrong by circumstances; but to God--what did they appear in God's sight? Remorse is not repentance, and remorse was the sole feeling of which they were capable. Leah's sleep was the slumber of the worn-out; Jim's self-promised reformation the result of shame. Shallow beings, miserable creatures, they could not plumb the depth of their wrong-doing. To them, sins were faults, and they were governed less by the Sermon on the Mount than by the laws of society. Indeed, it is questionable if either one of them was aware that such a sermon had been preached; but both knew to a hair how far they could go without being ostracised.
Jim was the better of the two, for the cold, brutal story told by his wife made him hot with the public-school shame of having done things which no fellow could do. The drastic codes of Eton and Harrow and Rugby and Winchester came to his mind, and he saw how he had sinned against the primitive laws of honour. Without oaths, he swore to lead a better and cleaner life with Leah to help him. He would be charitable and a good landlord, and take the chair at public dinners, and speak in the Lords, and chuck Lady Sandal--who was too expensive--and drop gambling to a certain extent, and not swear more than necessary, and--and--do what a man in his high position ought to do.
It will thus be seen that poor Jim's ideas of reformation were crude. He felt this himself, poor man, in his narrow brain; and like the child he really was, looked down to ask his clever wife's advice. He had no time to consider the irony of the thing, even if it had occurred to him, for discovering that Leah was sound asleep, he wondered hugely. From the placid expression of her face it was very plain that her crimes had not followed her into Dreamland. Jim whistled softly, marvelling that she could slumber so immediately after what she had told him. Laying her gently back on the sofa, he summoned her maid, and went about his own business. This was to begin reformation without loss of time.
"I must help Leah to be good," said the new broom.
But first he had to reform himself, and set about the first step, or what he conceived to be the first step, with the enthusiasm of the very bad person made uncomfortable by remorse. The vicar of Firmingham received a visit from his patron just as he was about to enjoy a well-earned dinner.
"Lionel," said the Duke, nervously, "I'm comin' to communion in a month. Could you get me whitewashed in that time?"