e an offer, even though Euphemia Smith had then commenced her
threats. With skill, might he not have done it on this very day? Might
he not have made the man understand that if he would base his claim
simply on his losses, and make it openly on that ground, then his claim
should be considered? But now it was too late, and the thunderbolt had
fallen.

What must he do first? Robert Bolton had promised to tell him on the
morrow whether he would act for him as his lawyer. He felt sure now that
his brother-in-law would not do so; but it would be necessary that he
should have an answer, and that necessity would give him an excuse for
going into Cambridge and showing himself among the Boltons. Let his
sufferings or his fears be what they might, he would never confess to
the world that he suffered or that he was frightened, by shutting
himself up. He would be seen about Cambridge, walking openly, as though
no reports, no rumours, had been spread about concerning him. He would
go to the houses of his wife's relations until he should be told that he
was not welcome.

'John,' his wife said to him that night, 'bear it like a man.'

'Am I not bearing it like a man?'

'It is crushing your very heart. I see it in your eyes.'

'Can you bear it?' He asked his question with a stern voice; but as he
asked it he turned to her and kissed her.

'Yes,' she said, 'yes. While I have you with me, and baby, I can bear
anything. While you will tell me everything that happens, I will bear
everything. And, John, when you were out just now, and when I am alone
and trying to pray, I told myself that I ought not to be unhappy; for I
would sooner have you and baby and all these troubles, than be back at
Chesterton--without you.'

'I wish you were back there. I wish you had never seen me.'

'If you say that, then I shall be crushed.'

'For your sake, my darling; for your sake,--for your sake! How shall I
comfort you when all those around you are saying that you are not my
wife?'

'By telling me that I am,' she said, coming and kneeling at his feet,
and looking up into his face. 'If you say so, you may be sure that I
shall believe no one who says the contrary.'

It was thus, and only now, that he began to know the real nature of the
woman whom he had succeeded in making his own, and of whom he found now
that even her own friends would attempt to rob him. 'I will bear it,' he
said, as he embraced her. 'I will bear it, if I can, like a man.'