tic. In my mind it is an imperious mandate of conscience;
and I peremptorily refuse to disobey it, although within three weeks an
execution will be in this house!'

I did not quite know what an execution meant; but from two harrowing
novels, with whose distresses I was familiar, I knew that it indicated some
direful process of legal torture and spoliation.

'Oh, uncle I--oh, sir!--you cannot allow this to happen. What will people
say of me? And--and there is poor Milly--and _everything_! Think what it
will be.'

'It cannot be helped--_you_ cannot help it, Maud. Listen to me. There will
be an execution here, I cannot say exactly how soon, but, I think, in a
little more than a fortnight. I must provide for your comfort. You must
leave. I have arranged that you shall join Milly, for the present, in
France, till I have time to look about me. You had better, I think, write
to your cousin, Lady Knollys. She, with all her oddities, has a heart. Can
you say, Maud, that I have been kind?'

'You have never been anything but kind,' I exclaimed.

'That I've been self-denying when you made me a generous offer?' he
continued. 'That I now act to spare you pain? You may tell her, not as a
message from me, but as a fact, that I am seriously thinking of vacating my
guardianship--that I feel I have done her an injustice, and that, so
soon as my mind is a little less tortured, I shall endeavour to effect a
reconciliation with her, and would wish ultimately to transfer the care
of your person and education to _her_. You may say I have no longer an
interest even in vindicating my name. My son has wrecked himself by a
marriage. I forgot to tell you he stopped at Feltram, and this morning
wrote to pray a parting interview. If I grant it, it shall be the last. I
shall never see him or correspond with him more.'

The old man seemed much overcome, and held his hankerchief to his eyes.

'He and his wife are, I understand, about to emigrate; the sooner the
better,' he resumed, bitterly. 'Deeply, Maud, I regret having tolerated his
suit to you, even for a moment. Had I thought it over, as I did the whole
case last night, nothing could have induced me to permit it. But I have
lived for so long like a monk in his cell, my wants and observation limited
to the narrow compass of this chamber, that my knowledge of the world has
died out with my youth and my hopes: and I did not, as I ought to have
done, consider many objections. Therefore, dear Maud