ld not, Charlotte, if it were not his own wish."

"His own wish?" she repeated.

"Yes! some time ago he told me of this; he said the one great thing he
longed for was to see you and me--you and me, my own Charlotte--husband
and wife before he died."

"Why did he keep his state of health as a secret from me?"

"I begged of him to tell you, but he wanted you to be his own bright
Charlotte to the end."

Then Hinton told her of that first interview he had with her father. He
told it well, but she hardly listened. Must she tell him the truth after
all? No! she would not. During her father's lifetime she would shield
him at any cost. Afterwards, ah! afterwards all the world would know.

When Hinton had ceased speaking, she laid her hand on his arm.
"Nevertheless, my darling, I cannot marry next week. I know you will
fail to understand me. I know my father will fail to understand me. That
is hard--the hardest part, but I am doing right. Some day you will
acknowledge that. With my father dying I cannot stand up in white and
call myself a bride. My marriage-day was to have been the entrance into
Paradise to me. With a funeral so near, and so certain, it cannot be
that. John--John--I--cannot--I cannot. We must not marry next week."

"You put it off, then? You deny your dying father his dearest wish? That
is not like you, Charlotte."

"No, it is unlike me. Everything, always, again, will be unlike me. If
you put it so, I deny my father his dearest wish."

"Charlotte, I fail to understand you. You will not marry during your
father's lifetime. But it may be very quiet--very--very quiet, I can
manage that; and you need not leave him, you can still be altogether his
daughter, and yet make him happy by letting him feel that you are also
my wife; that I have the right to shield you, the right to love and
comfort you. Come, Charlotte! come, my darling! we won't have any
outward festivity, any outward rejoicing. This is but natural, this can
be managed, and yet we may have that which is above and beyond it
all--one another. We may be one in our sorrow instead of our joy."

"Oh! if it could be," she sobbed; and now again she laid her head on his
shoulder.

"It shall be, Charlotte; we will marry like that on the twentieth. I
will manage it with your father."

"No John! no, my dearest, my best beloved, I cannot be your wife. Loving
you as I never--never--loved you before, I give you up; it is worse than
the agony of death to me