n why he did n't want me. I did, all right.

"Well, I laid my claims before him, pointing out that I was neither a
pauper nor a criminal; I told him that Belle and I sincerely loved each
other, and concluded by asking him whether he utterly disregarded his
daughter's preferences in her choice of friends.

"'Far from it,' he replied. 'But I certainly interfere when I think
she is exercising bad judgment in such a choice.'

"All at once he leaned forward and rapped sharply with his knuckles
upon the table-desk, before which I was sitting.

"'One thing you fail to take into consideration,' he said, 'whether
wilfully or not, I don't know, of course; but--to me--it is the most
important factor of all.'

"And now, for the first time, I could see that he was not only
possessed by a deep-stirring anger, but that he had been in a
white-lipped fury during the whole of our conference. He went on:

"'You are Felix Page's nephew. I would rather see my daughter in her
coffin--yes, a thousand times rather--than allied with a man who has a
drop of that hound's blood in his veins. That, Mr. Maillot, is my
final word.'

"These amazing words, spoken in a voice which trembled with passion,
left me speechless. But presently I rose and bowed stiffly, utterly
dumfounded by the intensity of his hate for my uncle, but nevertheless
keenly incensed and mortified at the injustice he was doing me.

"What had I in common with Felix Page that I should meekly bow my head
before the wrath of his enemies? Nothing whatever but that bond of
kinship, to which neither of the persons most interested attached the
slightest importance. Mr. Page had ignored my very existence--not that
I had ever looked to him for anything, because I hadn't; but during all
my struggles--through school, college, my efforts at establishing a
practice--he never by so much as a word or sign acknowledged that he
was aware that there lived anywhere on the face of the earth such a
person as Royal Maillot. He had quarrelled with my mother shortly
after my father's death--when I was only a kid--because she would not
take charge of his household on conditions which would have been
intolerable; and then he washed his hands of his sister and her child,
I fancy.

"'Mr. Fluette,' said I at last, 'since your objections are not worthy
of a man of your intelligence and ideals, I choose to think, therefore,
that you don't sincerely entertain them; they are grossly unjust to
Be