"I cannot listen to your sentimentalisms. Does my wife seem happy when Adrian Carr calls upon her?"
"I think she is interested in him, Brother Jerome."
"Does she see him alone?"
"Often alone."
"And you say she seems pleased?"
"I think so. It is incomprehensible to me."
"Never mind whether you understand it or not. Do you know that by this news you are turning me into a devil? I'll risk everything—everything. I'll expose the whole vile conspiracy if my wife is entrapped into engaging herself to Adrian Carr."
Brother Jerome was no longer a weak-looking invalid; he began to pace his attic floor; a fire burnt in his sunken eyes, and he clenched his thin hands. For the time he was strong.
"Listen to me, Esther Helps. My wife shall run no risk of that kind. It was in the contract that that should be prevented. I sinned for her—yes, I willingly sinned for her—but she shall never sin for me. Rather than that we'll all go to penal servitude. I, and your father, and her father."