Her own father would never open his lips.

If you're to be hauled over the coals about this I'm the only man to do it.

And I'm going to." A look of sharp determination came into the minister's eyes; he had the momentary air of a small Scotch terrier with a bidding.

Finlay looked at him in startled recognition of another possible phase of his dilemma; he thought he knew it in every wretched aspect.

It was a bold reference of Dr Drummond's; it threw down the last possibility of withdrawal for Finlay; they must have it out now, man to man, with a little, perhaps, even in that unlikely place, of penitent to confessor.