Trix walked along the road from Woodleigh to Byestry in infinitely too happy a state of mind to think consistently of any one thing. She did not even think precisely definitely of the man who had caused this happiness. She knew only that the happiness was there.

The hoar frost still lay thickly on the hedges and the grass by the roadside. The frost finger had outlined the twigs, the blades of grass, the veins of dried leaves with the delicate precision nature alone can achieve. At one spot a tiny rivulet, arrested by the ice-king in its course from a field and down a bank, hung in long glistening icicles from jutting stones and frozen earth. Now and again her own footfall struck sharp and metallic on the hard road. The sky was cloudless, a clear, cold blue. A robin trilled its sweet, sad song to her from a frosted bough.

It was all amazingly like a frosted Christmas card, thought Trix, those Christmas cards her soul had adored in her childish days, and yet which, oddly enough, always brought with them a sentimental touch of sadness. Many things had brought this odd happy sadness to Trix as a child,—the sound of church bells across water, fire-light gleaming in the darkness from the uncurtained windows of some house, the moon shining on snow, a solitary tree backgrounded by a grey sky, or a flight of rooks at sunset.

It was a quarter to eleven or thereabouts when she reached Byestry, and she made her way at once to the little white-washed, thatched presbytery, separated from the road by a small front garden.

Trix walked up the path, and rang the bell. Father Dormer was at home, so his housekeeper announced, and she was shown into a small square room with a round table in the centre, and a vase of bronze chrysanthemums on the table.

Trix sat down and began to try and arrange her ideas. She was by now perfectly well aware that they were not only rather difficult to arrange, but would be infinitely more difficult to express. She sighed once or twice rather heavily, gazing thoughtfully at the bronze chrysanthemums the while, as if seeking inspiration from their feathery brown faces. And then the door opened and Father Dormer came in in his cassock, which he always wore in the morning.

“It is an unexpected pleasure to see you, Miss Devereux,” he said. “Please sit down again.”

Trix sat down, and so did Father Dormer.

“I only arrived yesterday,” said Trix, “and I came over to see you this morning because I wanted to ask you something rather particular.” Trix was feeling just a little nervous, she was also feeling that if she did not open the subject immediately, it was quite possible that she might leave the presbytery without having done so, despite all her preconceived intentions.

“Yes,” smiled Father Dormer. He was perfectly well aware that she was feeling a trifle nervous.

“Well,” said Trix, “it isn’t going to be quite easy to explain, because I can’t mention names. But as it is a thing I can’t make up my mind about,—about the right or wrong of doing it, I mean,—I thought I’d ask your advice.”

“That is always at your service,” he assured her as she stopped.

Trix heaved a little sigh. She leant forward in her chair, and rested her hands on the table.

“Well then, Father, it’s like this. I know something about someone which another person doesn’t know, and I think it is rather important that they should know it. The first person doesn’t know I know it, and mightn’t quite like it if they knew I knew it. Also I am pretty sure that they don’t want any one else to know it. But under the circumstances I think I’m justified in telling the second person, because it isn’t a thing like a scandal, or anything like that. But the difficulty is, that in telling the second person about the first person, I may either have to tell lies, or disclose a secret about a third person, and that is a secret I have promised not to tell. Do you think I ought to take the risk?”

Father Dormer listened attentively.

“Do you mind saying it again,” he asked politely as she ended. There was just the faintest possible twinkle in his eyes.

Trix laughed outright.

“Oh, Father, don’t try to be polite,” she urged. “I know it is the muddliest kind of explanation that ever existed. Can’t you suggest some way of making it clearer?”

“Supposing,” he said, “you call the first person A, the second B, and the third one C. And let me know first exactly your position towards A.”

“All right,” agreed Trix cheerfully. “And even supposing you guess the tiniest bit what I am talking about, you won’t let yourself guess, will you?”

Father Dormer assured her that he would not. He certainly felt she need have no smallest anxiety on that score, having in view her own method of explanation, but he tactfully refrained from saying so.

“Well,” began Trix again, and rather slowly, “A has a secret. He doesn’t know I know it, and I found it out quite by accident. He hasn’t said it is a secret, but I know it is, because nobody else knows about it. Well, B knows A, but doesn’t know A’s secret, and because she doesn’t know A’s secret she is unhappy about A’s conduct, whereas if she knew the secret I am pretty sure she wouldn’t be so unhappy. And A need never know B does know, even if I tell her. And I feel sure from A’s point of view it would not matter telling B, while it would be a good thing for B to know. But, in order to tell her, I may have to let her know how I learnt A’s secret, and in doing that I should possibly have to tell lies, or let her know C’s secret, which I promised not to tell. Because it was in meeting A that I found it out. Of course I may not have to do either, but there is the risk. Do you think I can take it? And is the matter quite clear now?”

Father Dormer smiled.

“I think I have grasped it,” he said. “Well, in the first place, it isn’t a matter of life and death, is it?”

“Oh no,” said Trix.

“Then if I were you, I wouldn’t take any risk about telling lies.”

“No,” said Trix relieved, “I thought I had better not. But then there is C’s secret.”

“Let us take A’s secret first,” suggested Father Dormer. “You feel quite sure it is important to let B know it, and that you are justified in disclosing it?”

Trix reflected.

“I feel quite sure it is important B should know,” she said. “And I feel pretty sure I am justified in disclosing it. At first I thought perhaps I ought not to do so. But I know B won’t tell any one else, so it can’t matter her knowing as well as me. No; I am sure it can’t,” ended Trix decidedly.

“Then,” said Father Dormer, “your best plan will be to ask C to release you from your promise.”

Trix started.

“Oh, but—” she began. She shook her head. “I don’t believe he would ever release me,” she said.

“You could ask him, anyhow,” said Father Dormer.

“Yes, I could,” replied Trix doubtfully.

“Try that first,” he suggested. “It is the simplest plan.”

“Yes,” said Trix still doubtfully.

Of course it sounded the simplest plan to Father Dormer, but then he had not the remotest idea of what the secret was, nor whom it concerned.

“You see,” said Trix thoughtfully, “he knows A’s secret too; at least, I feel sure he does.”

“Perhaps,” smiled Father Dormer, “it is not quite such a secret as you imagine.”

“Oh, yes, it is,” nodded Trix. “It is the most complicated affair that ever was, and the most extraordinary. Nobody would believe it if they didn’t know.” She sighed.

Father Dormer watched her. He saw that she evidently did consider it a complicated situation, though, in spite of her rather complicated explanation it had appeared quite simple to him. At all events, the solution had. It had not even—as soon as he had grasped the question she had come to ask—appeared to involve much difficulty of answering. It was quite obvious she ought not to run the risk of telling lies (he could guess that her honesty would make it exceedingly difficult for her to evade any awkward questions without telling them), mainly because it was never right to tell lies, but also because the smallest white one—so-called—would appear extremely black to Trix.

“Is that settled now?” he asked.

“Oh, yes,” said Trix. She looked at her watch. “I’ve two hours; I had better do it at once.” Then she stopped suddenly. “Oh, Father!” she exclaimed.

“Well?” he queried.

“You didn’t guess, did you?”

“How could I?” he asked smiling.

“Oh, because saying that told you that C lived here.”

He laughed. “My dear child, when you arrive at Woodleigh one day, and ask me a rather complicated question the next, it is perfectly obvious it is one which has to be settled in this neighbourhood, and at once. I could hardly imagine you have travelled down here on purpose to consult me; or that, if it were a question to be settled in town, you would not wait till your return to consult some other priest on the subject.”

Trix smiled.

“I never thought of that,” she owned. “But, of course, it is quite obvious. Only I am so afraid of breaking my promise.”

She had risen to her feet by now. He held out his hand.

“I would not worry about that, if I were you. You have not broken it in the smallest degree. But now go and get leave to break it, if you can, and set your mind at rest.”