"Are these the articles you read?" she asked; taking the clippings from her muff.
Miss Lucretia put on her spectacles.
"I have seen both of them," she said.
"And do you believe what they say about—about Jethro Bass?"
Poor Miss Lucretia! For once in her life she was at a loss. She, too, paid a deference to that face, young as it was. She had robbed herself of sleep trying to make up her mind what she would say upon such an occasion if it came. A wonderful virgin faith had to be shattered, and was she to be the executioner? She loved the girl with that strange, intense affection which sometimes comes to the elderly and the lonely, and she had prayed that this cup might pass from her. Was it possible that it was her own voice using very much the same words for which she had rebuked Mrs. Merrill?
"Cynthia," she said, "those articles were written by politicians, in a political controversy. No such articles can ever be taken literally."
"Miss Lucretia, do you believe what it says about Jethro Bass?" repeated
Cynthia.
How was she to avoid those eyes? They pierced into, her soul, even as her own had pierced into Mrs. Merrill's. Oh, Miss Lucretia, who pride yourself on your plain speaking, that you should be caught quibbling! Miss Lucretia blushed for the first time in many, years, and into her face came the light of battle.
"I am a coward, my dear. I deserve your rebuke. To the best of my knowledge and belief, and so far as I can judge from the inquiries I have undertaken, Jethro Bass has made his living and gained and held his power by the methods described in those articles."
Miss Lucretia took off her spectacles and wiped them. She had committed a fine act of courage.