Page:What Maisie Knew (Chicago & New York, Herbert S. Stone & Co., 1897).djvu/275

Rh glimpse, almost awe-stricken in its gratitude, of the miracle her old governess had wrought. That functionary could not, in this connection, have been more impressive, even at second-hand, if she had been a prophetess with an open scroll or some ardent abbess speaking with the lips of the Church. She had clung day by day to their plastic associate, plying him with her deep, narrow passion, doing her simple utmost to convert him, and so inspiring him that he had at last really embraced his fine chance. That the chance was not delusive was sufficiently guaranteed by the completeness with which he could finally figure it out that, in case of his taking action, neither Ida nor Beale, whose book on each side it would only too well suit, would make any sort of row.

It sounds, no doubt, too penetrating, but it was by no means all through Sir Claude's betrayals that Maisie was able to piece together the beauty of the special influence through which, for such stretches of time, he had refined upon propriety by keeping so far as possible his sentimental interests distinct. She had ever of course in her mind fewer names than conceptions, but it was only with this drawback that she now made