ten to her and told her that
her father, Mr. Stanton, was right; that it would be better that he did
not resume his teaching. He had done this, that her happiness might
not be destroyed by the coming to light of the scandal that had been
dead and buried so many years. He felt it would not be right in the
highest sense for him to expose Stanton merely to gratify his own sense
of revenge. He believed that his child had learned to love Stanton as
her own father; that it would be a cruelty to her to expose him; that
it would rob her of her social position and perhaps of the man she
loved. The girl might even turn on him and hate him for his selfish
indulgence of revenge at the expense of her happiness. At the very
best, he had nothing to offer her, and he knew she would refuse
Stanton's bounty when she learned the truth. Von Barwig had reasoned
it out on these lines, and at every fresh pang of suffering he found
comfort in the false logic that seemed so like truth. It never
occurred to him that Helene disliked Stanton; that she felt in her
heart that the man was not her father; and that young Cruger would have
married her in spite of a dozen scandals. Furthermore, he did not even
dream that his pupil loved him and grieved for him to such an extent,
that Stanton felt it absolutely necessary to separate them completely
by telling her that her old music master had gone back to Germany and
had died there. The car windows rattled noisily and the bells jangled
monotonously, as the horses tramped through the snow on their way
uptown, but Von Barwig heard them not, for his brain was thronged with
thoughts of his darling Helene and his impending departure to his own
country. How could he leave those kind hearts in Houston
Street--Jenny, Poons, Miss Husted, Fico, Pinac! What would they all
say?

Von Barwig bought a morning paper and in it he read that his daughter's
marriage was to be attended by a very large and fashionable audience;
that admission to the church was only by personal invitation. Von
Barwig started. How was he to get into the church? He had no card of
invitation. He almost laughed aloud as he thought of his position; her
own father would not see her married because he had no invitation. He
must invent some story to get in, but he must attract no attention. No
one who knew of his association with the family must see him. He dare
not risk a public _expose_ at the eleventh hour. No, her happiness
must