"They know then?"

"Oh yes; I have taken care that they should know," he answered,
laughing defiantly again.

"And your mother--does she know?"

He paused, and looked at her very hard.

"God forbid."

"She is--"

"She is in heaven, where nothing is known of what goes on upon
earth."

"How can you tell that?"

"There would be no peace in heaven otherwise, Mistress Pemberthy;
only great grief, intense shame, misery, despair, madness, at the
true knowledge of us all," he said, passionately. "On earth we men
are hypocrites and liars, devils and slaves."

"Not all men," said Sophie, thinking of Reu Pemberthy.

"I have met none other. Perhaps I have sought none other--all my
own fault, they will tell you where my father is; where," he added,
bitterly, "they are worse than I am, and yet, oh, so respectable."