"Mary," he said in low voice.
She started, turning her blank unseeing eyes upon him.
"Be careful what you do now.... You are hardening your heart.... Judge not, that you be not judged.... When pain comes to us, it is a symptom, a sign that something is wrong in our life. We must look through the pain to what caused it, and set it right. We must do it humbly, not setting ourselves up above the sinner. If another has sinned against us, let us see why. Are we free of blame for that sin? If we had been all that we should have been, would this have happened? Let us try to understand.... They that have eyes to see, let them see...."
There was no response in those blank eyes, no sign that she had heard. In her intense preoccupation she simply stared at him instead of at the window.
Mary was making up her mind. Something in her heard and registered Hilary's words; but they did not enter into the question that was absorbing her. This was a purely practical question. She had to decide what she was going to do now. And those well-known phrases uttered in Hilary's deep urgent voice as though they were new—they to all appearance passed by her like the idle wind.
She could see already what she was going to do. She was not going to make a scandal, nor have any one talking about her or pitying her. Enough, that she had complained to Hilary!... This thing should be as if it never had been, so far as her outward life went—no one should know. She would not "leave" her husband. But the sinner would not go unpunished.... She knew well how to punish him. She knew how to make him suffer....
Now, resolved, she rose to her feet.
"The baby! He always wakes about five—if I'm not there he'll be frightened. I must go back at once."
Hilary looked piercingly at her.