passion. Here was an old temptation.

"God forbid!" he said. "Observe forms, and let her hope of spiritual life
die? No, no,--not that. Form without soul is dead. You must have seen
that too often."

"Well, I'll tell you what to do," said the rector, in his eagerness
pulling his chair closer to John's, and resting his hand almost
confidentially upon his knee: "if you fear her influence in your
parish,--and of course I understand that,--why, give her a letter
to another church."

John half smiled, but did not answer. The room had grown dark as they
talked, and now Alfaretta brought a lamp, looking curiously at the
rector, as she passed him. "Supper's ready, Mr. Ward," she said.

"Yes," John said. "Dr. Howe, I hope"--

But the rector plunged again into argument. Once he stopped, and said,
"So, surely, she can return?"

"It is impossible," John answered quietly.

And again, "You will let me send her back?"

And he said, "No."

At last, wearied and baffled, Dr. Howe rose. He leaned heavily forward
on the table, his open palm resting on the volume of sermons, which
Alfaretta had lifted from the floor, and he looked steadily at John.
"Then, sir," he said slowly, "I am to understand, for my niece, that this
monstrous decision of yours is fixed and unchangeable? We cannot hope
that her love, or her youth, or your duty, or the miserable scandal of
the affair, will ever move your cruel determination?"

John rose, too. The interview had been a terrible strain. His courage
was unshaken, but his strength was leaving him; a pathetic desire for
sympathy and understanding seized him. "I love her too much to change.
Don't you understand? But I cling to more than human strength, when I
say, I will not change."

"Then, by Heaven," cried the rector, "neither shall she! With my consent
she shall never return to a man who reads such books as those," and he
pointed to the row of Edwards,--"a man who denies good in anything
outside his own miserable conception of religion; the very existence of
whose faith is a denunciation and execration of every one who does not
agree with him. You are firm, sir? So is she! I bid you good-day."

He turned to the door, breathing hard through his shut teeth. John Ward
followed him, and laid his hand upon his arm. "Do not go," he said;
"there is much I would like to say; and you will spend the night here
with me? I beg that you will not go."

"The roof which refuses to shelter my niece," answer