her. I will have a word with him
this evening."

"I thank you for that, at least," said Hedwig, as he moved to the
door.

"Do not mention it," said he, and put his hand on the lock.

A sudden impulse seized Hedwig. She ran swiftly to him, and clasped
her hands upon his arm.

"Father?" she cried, pleadingly.

"What?"

"Father, do you love me?" He hesitated one moment.

"No," he said, sternly; "you disobey me"; and he went out in rough
haste. The door closed behind him, and she was left standing alone.
What could she do, poor child? For months he had tormented her and
persecuted her, and now she had asked him plainly if she still held a
place in his heart, and he had coldly denied it.

A gentle, tender maiden, love-sick and mind-sick, yearning so
piteously for a little mercy, or sympathy, or kindness, and treated
like a mutinous soldier, because she loved so honestly and purely,--is
it any wonder that her hand went to her bosom and clasped the cold,
hard keys that promised her life and freedom? I think not. I have no
patience with young women who allow themselves to be carried away by
an innate bad taste and love for effect, quarrelling with the peaceful
destiny that a kind Providence has vouchsafed them, and with an
existence which they are too dull to make interesting to themselves or
to anyone else; finally making a desperate and foolish dash at
notoriety by a runaway marriage with the first scamp they can find,
and repenting in poverty and social ostracism the romance they
conceived in wealth and luxury. They deserve their fate. But when a
sensitive girl is motherless, cut off from friends and pleasures,
presented with the alternative of solitude or marriage with some
detested man, or locked up to forget a dream which was half realised
and very sweet, then the case is different. If she breaks her bonds,
and flies to the only loving heart she knows, forgive her, and pray
Heaven to have mercy on her, for she takes a fearful leap into the
dark.

Hedwig felt the keys, and took them from her dress, and pressed them
to her cheek, and her mind was made up. She glanced at the small gilt
clock, and saw that the hands pointed to seven. Five hours were before
her in which to make her preparations, such as they could be.

In accordance with her father's orders, given when he left her,
Temistocle served her dinner in her sitting-room; and the uncertainty
of the night's enterprise demanded that she should eat somethi