The Vicar went to the Manor House after the evening service, and he and John Treverton were closeted together in the library for an hour or more, during which time John told his wife’s trustee all that had happened at Auray, and showed him documents which proved Marie Pomellec’s marriage with Jean Kergariou, and Kergariou’s death two years after her second marriage.
‘Providence has been very good to you, John Treverton,’ said the Vicar when he had heard everything. ‘You cannot be too grateful for your escape from disgrace and difficulty. But I hope you will always remember that your own sin is not lessened by this discovery. I hope that you honestly and truly repent that sin.’
‘Can I do otherwise?’ asked John Treverton sadly. ‘Has it not brought fear and sorrow upon one I love better than myself? The thing was done to benefit her, but I feel now that it was not the less dishonourable.’
‘Well, we will try to forget all about it,’ said the good-natured Vicar, who, in exhorting a sinner to repentance, never wished to make the burden of remorse too heavy. ‘I only desired that you should see your conduct in a proper light, as a Christian and a gentleman. God knows how grateful I am to Him for His mercy to you and my dear Laura. It would have almost broken my heart to see you turned out of this house.’
‘Like Adam and Eve out of Paradise,’ said Treverton, smiling, ‘and my poor Eve a sinless sufferer.’
After this serious talk the Vicar and his host went back to the drawing-room, where Laura and Celia were sitting by a glorious wood fire reading Robertson’s sermons.
‘What a darling he was!’ cried Celia, with a gush. ‘And how desperately in love with him I should have been if I had lived at Brighton in his time and heard him preach! His are the only sermons I can read without feeling bored. If that dear prosy old father of mine would only take a lesson——’
Her father’s entrance silenced her just as she was about to criticise his capabilities as a preacher. The Vicar went straight to Laura, and took both her hands in his hearty grasp.
‘My dear, dear girl,’ he said, ‘Providence has ordered all things well for you. You have no more trouble to fear!’
It was not till the next morning that Laura remembered her husband’s anxious tenant from Beechampton. Husband and wife were breakfasting together tête-à-tête in the book-room at half-past seven, John Treverton dressed in his hunting gear, ready to start for a six-mile ride to the meet of staghounds among the pasture-clad hills. Celia, who did not consider that her obligations as a guest included early rising, was still luxuriating in morning dreams.