"Judge not, brother," he said;
"the heart is a dark well." Keith's yellowish face grew red and swollen,
as though he were mastering the tickle of a bronchial cough. "What
are you going to do, then? I suppose I may ask you not to be entirely
oblivious of our name; or is such a consideration unworthy of your
honour?" Laurence bent his head. The gesture said more clearly than
words: 'Don't kick a man when he's down!'
"I don't know what I'm going to do--nothing at present. I'm awfully
sorry, Keith; awfully sorry."
Keith looked at him, and without another word went out.
VI
To any, save philosophers, reputation may be threatened almost as much
by disgrace to name and family as by the disgrace of self. Keith's
instinct was always to deal actively with danger. But this blow, whether
it fell on him by discovery or by confession, could not be countered. As
blight falls on a rose from who knows where, the scandalous murk would
light on him. No repulse possible! Not even a wriggling from under!
Brother of a murderer hung or sent to penal servitude! His daughter
niece to a murderer! His dead mother-a murderer's mother! And to wait
day after day, week after week, not knowing whether the blow would fall,
was an extraordinarily atrocious penance, the injustice of which, to a
man of rectitude, seemed daily the more monstrous.
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