ll," he answered, "if he wants her, and she wants him, I don't see
what that's got to do with it." He looked straight forward, and not at
his wife.

She laid her hands on the reins. "Now, you stop right here, Silas
Lapham! If I thought that--if I really believed you could be willing to
break that poor child's heart, and let Pen disgrace herself by marrying
a man that had as good as killed her sister, just because you wanted
Bromfield Corey's son for a son-in-law----"

Lapham turned his face now, and gave her a look. "You had better NOT
believe that, Persis! Get up!" he called to the mare, without glancing
at her, and she sprang forward. "I see you've got past being any use
to yourself on this subject."

"Hello!" shouted a voice in front of him. "Where the devil you goin'
to?"

"Do you want to KILL somebody!" shrieked his wife.

There was a light crash, and the mare recoiled her length, and
separated their wheels from those of the open buggy in front which
Lapham had driven into. He made his excuses to the occupant; and the
accident relieved the tension of their feelings, and left them far from
the point of mutual injury which they had reached in their common
trouble and their unselfish will for their children's good.

It was Lapham who resumed the talk. "I'm afraid we can't either of us
see this thing in the right light. We're too near to it. I wish to
the Lord there was somebody to talk to about it."

"Yes," said his wife; "but there ain't anybody."

"Well, I dunno," suggested Lapham, after a moment; "why not talk to the
minister of your church? May be he could see some way out of it."

Mrs. Lapham shook her head hopelessly. "It wouldn't do. I've never
taken up my connection with the church, and I don't feel as if I'd got
any claim on him."

"If he's anything of a man, or anything of a preacher, you HAVE got a
claim on him," urged Lapham; and he spoiled his argument by adding,
"I've contributed enough MONEY to his church."

"Oh, that's nothing," said Mrs. Lapham. "I ain't well enough
acquainted with Dr. Langworthy, or else I'm TOO well. No; if I was to
ask any one, I should want to ask a total stranger. But what's the
use, Si? Nobody could make us see it any different from what it is, and
I don't know as I should want they should."

It blotted out the tender beauty of the day, and weighed down their
hearts ever more heavily within them. They ceased to talk of it a
hundred times, and still c