The employer eyed him gravely, pulling on his gloves. The story alluded to was not unknown to him: how one modern girl, claiming more Freedom than existed, had too rashly crossed the great gulf, and how, her enterprise proving fatally unsuccessful, she had lately come home again. He felt very sorry for Miss Trevenna.
"Fact!—her mother visits her in secret, in lodgings," said his secretary, dropping his eager voice further. "A sad case—sad, yes—but, my dear fellow, can we allow our girls to run off with other people's husbands? No! Morals," said Judge Blenso, sternly, "are the bulwark of the nation!—that's what I say! Am I right, Charles?"
"NO! MORALS ARE THE BULWARK OF THE NATION!"
Charles said that he was perfectly right. He then proposed that the Judge should knock off work for the night, forthwith. But the Judge looked rather shocked at the suggestion, and began to clack vigorously at Dionysius.
"There's really no hurry about this short stuff, you know. Why not go down and cheer Mrs. Herman up a bit? She always appreciates a call from you."
The relative's hand irresistibly rose to his mustache.