point of view, and now I believe I
do. I am not going to see my daughter; I am going away."

He stood up, in token of his purpose, and at the same moment my wife
entered the room. She must have been hurrying to do so from the moment I
left her, for she had on a fresh dress, and her hair had the effect of
being suddenly, if very effectively, massed for the interview from the
dispersion in which I had lately seen it. She swept me with a glance of
reproach, as she went up to Tedham, in the pretence that he had risen to
meet her, and gave him her hand. I knew that she divined all that had
passed between us, but she said:

"Mr. March has told you that we have seen Mrs. Hasketh, and that you can
find your daughter at her house to-morrow evening?"

"Yes, and I have just been telling him that I am not going to see her."

"That is very foolish--very wrong!" my wife began.

"I know you must say so," Tedham replied, with more dignity and force
than I could have expected, "and I know how kind you and Mr. March have
been. But you must see that I am right--that she is the only one to be
considered at all."

"Right! How are you right? Have _you_ been suggesting that, my dear?"
demanded my wife, with a gentle despair of me in her voice.

It almost seemed to me that I had, but Tedham came to my rescue most
unexpectedly.

"No, Mrs. March, he hasn't said anything of the kind to me; or, if he
has, I haven't heard it. But you intimated, yourself, last night, that
she might be so situated--"

"I was a wicked simpleton," cried my wife, and I forebore to triumph,
even by a glance at her; "to put my doubts between you and your daughter
in any way. It was romantic, and--and--disgusting. It's not only your
right to see her, it's your _duty_. At least it's your duty to let her
decide whether she will let you see her. What nonsense! Of course she
will! She must bear her part in it. She ought not to escape it, even if
she could. Now you must just drop all idea of going away, and you must
stay, and you must go to see your daughter. There is no other way to
do."

Tedham shook his head stubbornly. "She has borne her share, already, and
I won't inflict my penalty on her innocence--"

"Innocence? It's _because_ she is innocent that it must be inflicted
upon her! That is what innocence is in the world for!"

Tedham looked back at her in a dull bewilderment. "I can't get back to
that. It seemed so once; but now it looks selfish, and I'm afra