“Or make up to them,” said St. Clair, “a little—as much as any one can make up for that greatest of misfortunes—for being bad.”
Lucy looked from one to another, bewildered, not knowing which to follow.
“Yes, it is the greatest of all misfortunes; but still that is sophistry; that argument is all wrong. If the good and the bad got just the same, why should any one be good?”
“Oh!” said Lucy, with a heave of her breast; but though her heart rose and the color came to her cheeks, she had not sufficient power of language to communicate her sentiments, and she was grateful to St. Clair, who interposed.
“Do you think,” he said, “that any one is good, as you say, for what he gets? One is good because one can’t help it—or for the pleasure of it—or to please some one else if it does not please one’s self.”
“For shame, Frank, you take all the merit out of goodness,” his aunt said.
“Oh, no!” Lucy breathed out of the bottom of her heart. She could not argue, but her soft eyes turned upon St. Clair with gratitude. Perhaps he was not quite right either, but he was far more right than Mrs. Stone.
“Miss Trevor agrees with me,” he said quietly, as if that settled the question; and Lucy would not have been human had she not been gratified, and flattered, and happy. She looked at him with a silent glow of thanks in her eyes, even though in her heart she felt a slight rising of ridicule, as if it could matter whether she agreed or not!
“This is all very fine,” said Mrs. Stone, “but practically it remains certain that the people who merit your kindness are those to whom you ought to give it, Lucy. I did not know your father had left instructions about your charities.”
“He did not quite mean charities,” said Lucy; “it was that I should help people who wanted help. He thought we—owed it, having so much: and I think so too.”