"`What then?' O Licorice!"

"I do wish thou wouldst speak sense!--what art thou driving at?"

"Thou art hard to please, wife. If I speak plainly thou wilt not hear
me out, and if I only hint thou chidest me for want of plainness. Well!
if thou canst not see `what then,' never mind. I thought those
sorrowful words of my poor child might have touched thy heart. I can
assure thee, they did mine, when I heard of them. They have never been
out of mine ears since."

It seemed plain to Belasez that her mother was being rebuked for want of
motherly tenderness, and, as she doubted not, towards Anegay. This
mysterious person, then, must have been a sister of whom she had never
heard,--probably much older than herself.

"What a lot of soft down must have been used up to make thine heart!"
was the cynical reply of Licorice.

"I cannot help it, Licorice. I have her eyes ever before me--hers, and
his. It is of no use scolding me--I cannot help it. And if it be as
thou thinkest, I cannot break the child's heart. I shall not speak to
Hamon, nor the Cohen."

"Faint-hearted Gentile!" blazed forth Licorice.

"Get it over, wife," said Abraham, quietly. "I will try to find out if
thou hast guessed rightly; though it were rather work for thee than me,
if--well, I will do my best. But suppose I should find that she has
given her maiden heart to some Gentile,--what am I to do then?"

"Do! What did Phinehas the son of Eleazar the priest unto Zimri and
Cozbi? Hath not the Blessed One commanded, saying, `Thy daughter thou
shalt not give unto his son'? What meanest thou? Do! Couldst thou do
too much, even if they were offered upon the altar before the God of
Sabaoth?"

"Where is it?" responded Abraham, desolately. "But, Licorice,--_our_
daughter?"

"What dost thou mean?" said Licorice, fiercely. "Perhaps we might shed
tears first. But they must not pollute the sacrifice. Do not the holy
Rabbins say that a tear dropped upon a devoted lamb washeth out all the
merit of the offering?"

"I believe they do," said Abraham; "though it is not in the Thorah. But
I did not mean exactly that. Dost thou not understand me?"

"I understand that thou art no true son of Abraham!" burst out his wife.
"I say she is, and she shall be!"

"Who ever heard of such reckoning in the days of the fathers?" answered
Abraham. "Licorice, I am doubtful if we have done well in keeping back
the truth so much. Doth not the Holy One love a