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eeded in making any real impression upon him. All she could obtain at first was delay, and that Catharine should be informed.
As soon as that had been done, the position became once more curiously complex. Here was a woman to whom the whole Modernist Movement was anathema, driven finally into argument for the purpose of compelling the Modernist leader, the contriver and general of Modernist victory, to remain at his post!
For it was part of Catharine's robust character to look upon any pledge, any accepted responsibility, as something not to be undone by any mere feeling, however sharp, however legitimate. You had undertaken the thing, and it must, at all costs, be carried through. That was the dominant habit of her mind; and there were persons connected with her on whom the rigidity of it had at times worked harshly.
On this occasion it was no doubt interfered with--(the Spirit of Comedy would have found a certain high satisfaction in the dilemma)--by the fact that Meynell's persistence in the course he had entered upon must be, in her eyes, and sub specie religionis, a persistence in heresy and unbelief. What decided it ultimately, however, was that she was not only an orthodox believer, but a person of great common sense--and Mary's mother.
Her natural argument was that after the tragic events which had occurred, and the public reports of them which had appeared, Meynell's abrupt withdrawal from public life would once more unsettle and confuse the public mind. If there had been any change in his opinions--
"Oh! do not imagine"--she turned a suddenly glowing face upon him--"I should be trying to dissuade you, if that were your reason. No!--it is for personal and private reasons you shrink from the responsibility of leadership. And that being so, what must the world say--the ignorant world that loves to think evil?"
He looked at her a little reproachfully.
"Those are not arguments that come very naturally from you!"
"They are the right ones