She fanned herself slowly, and answered nonchalantly: "Crime is a word of many meanings.

I read in the papers of political crimes--it is a common phrase; yet the criminals appear to go unpunished." "There you are wrong," he answered cynically.

"The punishment is, that political virtue goes unrewarded, and in due course crime is the only refuge to most.

Yet in politics the temptation to be virtuous is great." She laughed now with a sense of relief.

The intellectual stimulant had brought back the light to her face.