for us that you should suffer, dearest! Think
of the dreadful meanness and baseness of what you will have to
acknowledge.'

'Yes!' sighed the youth, and his eyes, in his extreme pain, turned to
the Countess reproachfully.

'Think, dear,' Caroline hurried on, 'he gains nothing for whom you
do this--you lose all. It is not your deed. You will have to speak an
untruth. Your ideas are wrong--wrong, I know they are. You will have to
lie. But if you are silent, the little, little blame that may attach to
us will pass away, and we shall be happy in seeing our brother happy.'

'You are talking to Evan as if he had religion,' said the Countess, with
steady sedateness. And at that moment, from the sublimity of his pagan
virtue, the young man groaned for some pure certain light to guide him:
the question whether he was about to do right made him weak. He took
Caroline's head between his two hands, and kissed her mouth. The act
brought Rose to his senses insufferably, and she--his Goddess of truth
and his sole guiding light-spurred him afresh.

'My family's dishonour is mine, Caroline. Say nothing more--don't think
of me. I go to Lady Jocelyn tonight. To-morrow we leave, and there's the
end. Louisa, if you have any new schemes for my welfare, I beg you to
renounce them.'

'Gratitude I never expected from a Dawley!' the Countess retorted.

'Oh, Louisa! he is going!' cried Caroline; 'kneel to him with me: stop
him: Rose loves him, and he is going to make her hate him.'

'You can't talk reason to one who's mad,' said the Countess, more like
the Dawley she sprang from than it would have pleased her to know.

'My darling! My own Evan! it will kill me,' Caroline exclaimed, and
passionately imploring him, she looked so hopelessly beautiful, that
Evan was agitated, and caressed her, while he said, softly: 'Where our
honour is not involved I would submit to your smallest wish.'

'It involves my life--my destiny!' murmured Caroline.

Could he have known the double meaning in her words, and what a saving
this sacrifice of his was to accomplish, he would not have turned to do
it feeling abandoned of heaven and earth.

The Countess stood rigidly as he went forth. Caroline was on her knees,
sobbing.

CHAPTER XXXIV. A PAGAN SACRIFICE

Three steps from the Countess's chamber door, the knot of Evan's
resolution began to slacken. The clear light of his simple duty grew
cloudy and complex. His pride would not let him think that