emotional or _poseurs_ like
some other nations, and Hector Bracondale was essentially a man of the
world, and rather a whimsical cynic as well. So to see him thus moved
must mean great things. She was guilty, too, for helping to create the
situation. She must do what she could for him, she felt.

"You should pull yourself together, mon cher Bracondale," she said; "it
is not like you to be limp and undecided. You had better stay for the
party, and make yourself behave like a gentleman, and how you mean to
continue. We have passed the days when 'Oh no, we never mention him' is
the order, and 'never meeting,' and that sort of thing. You are bound to
meet unless you go into the wilds. And you must face it and try to
forget her."

"I can never forget her," he said, in a deep voice; "but, as you say, I
must face it and do my best."

"You see," continued the widow, "the girl has only been married a year,
and her husband is the most unattractive human being you could find
along a sidewalk of miles; but he is her husband, anyway, and she may
have children."

Hector clinched his hands in a convulsive movement of anguish and rage.

"And you must realize all these possibilities, and settle a path for
yourself and stick to it."

"Oh, I couldn't bear that!" he said. "It would be better I should take
her away myself now, to-day."

"You will do no such thing!" said the widow, sternly, and she sat up
again. "You forget I am going to marry her father, and I shall look upon
her as my daughter and protect her from wolves--do you hear? And what is
more, she is too good and true to go with you. She has a backbone if
you haven't; and she'll see it her duty to stick to that lump of
middle-class meat she is bound to--and she'll do her best, if she
suffers to heart-break. It is she, the poor, little white dove, that you
and I have wounded between us, that I pity, not you--great, strong man!"

Mrs. McBride's eyes flashed.

"Oh, you are all the same, you Englishmen. Beasts to kill and women to
subjugate--the only aims in life!"

"Don't!" said Hector. "I am not the animal you think me. I worship
Theodora, and I would devote my life and its best aims to secure her
happiness and do her honor; but don't you see you have drawn a picture
that would drive any man mad--"

"I said you had to face the worst, and I calculate the worst for you
would be to see her with some little Browns along. My! How it makes you
wince! Well, face it then and