g,
save that he was good and kind, and the only creature in the world who
had ever cared for her."

"Poor girl!"

"John,"--startled by his manner--"you have something to tell me? You
know who this is--this man who has stood between my son and his
happiness?"

"Yes, I do know."

I cannot say how far the mother saw--what, as if by a flash of
lightning, _I_ did; but she looked up in her husband's face, with a
sudden speechless dread.

"Love, it is a great misfortune, but it is no one's blame--neither
ours, nor theirs--they never thought of Guy's loving her. He says
so--Edwin himself."

"Is it Edwin?"--in a cry as if her heart was breaking. "His own
brother--his very own brother! Oh, my poor Guy!"

Well might the mother mourn! Well might the father look as if years of
care had been added to his life that day! For a disaster like this
happening in any household--especially a household where love is
recognized as a tangible truth, neither to be laughed at, passed
carelessly over, nor lectured down--makes the family cease to be a
family, in many things, from henceforward. The two strongest feelings
of life clash; the bond of brotherly unity, in its perfectness, is
broken for ever.

For some minutes we sat, bewildered as it were, thinking of the tale as
if it had been told of some other family than ours. Mechanically the
mother raised her eyes; the first object they chanced to meet was a
rude water-colour drawing, kept, coarse daub as it was, because it was
the only reminder we had of what never could be recalled--one
red-cheeked child with a hoop, staring at another red-cheeked child
with a nosegay--supposed to represent little Edwin and little Guy.

"Guy taught Edwin to walk. Edwin made Guy learn his letters. How fond
they were of one another--those two boys. Now--brother will be set
against brother! They will never feel like brothers--never again."

"Love--"

"Don't, John! don't speak to me just yet. It is so terrible to think
of. Both my boys--both my two noble boys! to be made miserable for
that girl's sake. Oh! that she had never darkened our doors. Oh! that
she had never been born."

"Nay, you must not speak thus. Remember--Edwin loves her--she will be
Edwin's wife."

"Never!" cried the mother, desperately; "I will not allow it. Guy is
the eldest. His brother has acted meanly. So has she. No, John, I
will NOT allow it."

"You will not allow what has already happened--what Provide