nly said that this was a case in which it might be difficult for
you to see your duty plainly."

"Why should it be?"

"You would not have her--break her heart?" Then he was silent for
awhile, turning over in his mind the proposition which now seemed to
have been made to him. If the question came to that,--should she be
allowed to break her heart and die, or should he save her from that
fate by sanctioning her marriage with Tregear? If the choice could be
put to him plainly by some supernal power, what then would he choose?
If duty required him to prevent this marriage, his duty could not be
altered by the fact that his girl would avenge herself upon him by
dying! If such a marriage were in itself wrong, that wrong could not
be made right by the fear of such a catastrophe. Was it not often
the case that duty required that someone should die? And yet as he
thought of it,--thought that the someone whom his mind had suggested
was the one female creature now left belonging to him,--he put his
hand up to his brow and trembled with agony. If he knew, if in
truth he believed that such would be the result of firmness on his
part,--then he would be infirm, then he must yield. Sooner than that,
he must welcome this Tregear to his house. But why should he think
that she would die? This woman had now asked him whether he would
be willing to break his girl's heart. It was a frightful question;
but he could see that it had come naturally in the sequence of the
conversation which he had forced upon her. Did girls break their
hearts in such emergencies? Was it not all romance? "Men have died
and worms have eaten them,--but not for love." He remembered it all
and carried on the argument in his mind, though the pause was but for
a minute. There might be suffering, no doubt. The higher the duties
the keener the pangs! But would it become him to be deterred from
doing right because she for a time might find that she had made the
world bitter to herself? And were there not feminine wiles,--tricks
by which women learn to have their way in opposition to the judgment
of their lords and masters? He did not think that his Mary was
wilfully guilty of any scheme. The suffering he knew was true
suffering. But not the less did it become him to be on his guard
against attacks of this nature.

"No," he said at last; "I would not have her break her heart,--if I
understand what such words mean. They are generally, I think, used
fantastically."

"Yo