and sorrow. What shall I do?"

"I would advise you to go to Woodsome and tell Yanna so. She may
forgive you, but I doubt if she will ever love you again."

"She cannot help loving me. And if she loves, she will forgive."

"Do not be too sure of that. Yanna has the stubbornness of the Dutch
moral character, and her conscience is strictly Calvinistic. She finds
it very hard to forgive her own little peccadillos."

"Are you also angry, cousin? You have seen life, and you ought to make
allowances."

"Right is right, Harry Filmer; and wrong is wrong, even to me; and I
am angry and greatly disappointed with you. I have looked forward with
so much pleasure to your marriage with Yanna, for you see, sir, it was
to me not only a union of hearts and hands, but a union of lands.
Yanna is to have all I possess, and if you inherit your father's land,
old Peter Van Hoosen's estate will be nearly intact again. Now that
simple, conscientious old Dutchman is my hero. His likeness hangs in
my private sitting-room, and I have constantly promised him that I
would try and put the land he loved all right before I joined him. You
need not look at me, Harry, as if you thought I were crazy. I can tell
you that there is a motive in working to please the dead, which
working for the living has nothing to match. Anyway, they are not
always overturning your best-laid plans."

"I was only astonished, cousin."

"Whenever I manage to buy back an acre, I feel it to be a joy beyond
most earthly joys to stand before the mighty-looking old burgomaster
and say: 'Another acre put right, Father Peter.' And the canvas
speaks to me, and I dream of the old man, and I know that he knows;
and that is all about it! So then, you see, I am not the only one you
have disappointed. I am sure your ancestor is thoroughly ashamed of
you this day."

Miss Alida spoke with a singular calm intensity, and Harry was
affected by it. Some one tugged at his heart-strings whom he had never
before thought of, and he said humbly: "I am sorry! I am very sorry! I
will go and see Yanna to-day."

"Not to-day. Wait a little. Write to her first. She must have time to
understand herself. I expect my friend Selina Zabriski to-morrow, and
after her arrival I shall not be long in the city. When I return to
Woodsome, I will speak to Yanna for you. I do not say she ought to
forgive you, but I will ask her to do so. And I do not thank you,
Harry Filmer, for making me plead such a case.