ngs to be faced. First, I have to
set Marian and myself free."

"How?"

"Divorce her."

"Divorce!" Elinor looked at him in dismay. He was unmoved. Then her gaze
fell slowly, and she said: "Yes: I suppose you have a right to that."

"She also."

"So that she may marry him--from a sense of duty. That will be so happy
for her!"

"She will have time, before she is free to find out whether she likes
him or not. There will be a great fuss in the family over the scandal."

"Do you care about that? _I_ dont."

"No. However, thats a detail. Marian will perhaps write to you. If so,
just point out to her that her five hundred a year belongs to her still,
and makes her quite independent of him and of me. That is all, I think.
You need take no pains now to conceal what has happened: the servants
below know it as well as we: in a week it will be town talk."

Elinor looked wistfully at him, her impetuosity failing her as she felt
how little effect it was producing. Yet her temper rather rose than fell
at him. There was a much more serious hostility than before in her tone
as she said:

"You seem to have been thoroughly prepared for what has happened. I do
not want any instructions from you as to what I shall write to Marian
about her money affairs: I want to know, in case she takes it into her
head to come back when she has found what a fool she has made of
herself, whether I may tell her that you are glad to be rid of her, and
that there is no use in her humiliating herself by coming to your door
and being turned away."

"Shall I explain the situation to you from my point of view?" said he.
At the sound of his voice she looked up in alarm. The indulgent,
half-playful manner which she had almost lost the sense of because it
was so invariable with him in speaking to ladies was suddenly gone. She
felt that the real man was coming out now without ceremony. He was quick
to perceive the effect he had produced. To soften it, he placed a
comfortable chair on the hearthrug, and said, in his ordinary friendly
way: "Sit nearer the fire: we can talk more comfortably. Now," he
continued, standing with his back to the mantelpiece, "let me tell you,
Miss McQuinch, that when you talk of my turning people away from my door
you are not talking fair and square sense to me. I dont turn my
acquaintances off in that way, much less my friends; and a woman who has
lived with me as my wife for eighteen months must always be a rather
particular