ou?"

"You'd have gone about like a broken-winged old hen, and have
softened me that way."

"And now poor Arthur has had his wing broken."

"You mustn't let on to know that it's broken, and the wing will be
healed in due time. But what fools girls are!"

"Indeed they are, John;--particularly me."

"Fancy a girl like Emily Wharton," said he, not condescending to
notice her little joke, "throwing over a fellow like Arthur for a
greasy, black foreigner."

"A foreigner!"

"Yes;--a man named Lopez. Don't say anything about it at present.
Won't she live to find out the difference, and to know what she has
done! I can tell her of one that won't pity her."

CHAPTER XVII

Good-Bye

Arthur Fletcher received his brother's teaching as true, and took
his brother's advice in good part;--so that, before the morning
following, he had resolved that however deep the wound might be, he
would so live before the world, that the world should not see his
wound. What people already knew they must know,--but they should
learn nothing further either by words or signs from him. He would,
as he had said to his brother, "have it out with Emily"; and then,
if she told him plainly that she loved the man, he would bid her
adieu, simply expressing regret that their course for life should be
divided. He was confident that she would tell him the entire truth.
She would be restrained neither by false modesty, nor by any assumed
unwillingness to discuss her own affairs with a friend so true to
her as he had been. He knew her well enough to be sure that she
recognised the value of his love though she could not bring herself
to accept it. There are rejected lovers who, merely because they are
lovers, become subject to the scorn and even to the disgust of the
girls they love. But again there are men who, even when they are
rejected, are almost loved, who are considered to be worthy of all
reverence, almost of worship;--and yet the worshippers will not love
them. Not analysing all this, but somewhat conscious of the light in
which this girl regarded him, he knew that what he might say would be
treated with deference. As to shaking her,--as to talking her out of
one purpose and into another,--that to him did not for a moment seem
to be practicable. There was no hope of that. He hardly knew why he
should endeavour to say a word to her before he left Wharton. And yet
he felt that it must be said. Were he to allow her to be married to
this m