"Did you consent or refuse?"

"I refused."

"Well?"

"Then, as I knew he would, he suggested that I might as well get ready
to start for America as soon as possible."

Brand was speaking in a light and scornful way; but his face was
careworn, and his eyes kept turning to the windows and the dark night
outside, as if they were looking at something far away.

"About Natalie?" Lord Evelyn asked.

"Oh, he was frank enough. He dropped all those roundabout phrases about
the great honor, and so forth. He was quite plain. 'Not to be thought
of.'"

Lord Evelyn remained silent for some time.

"I am very sorry, Brand," he said at length; and then he continued with
some hesitation--"Do you know--I have been thinking that--that though
it's a very extreme thing for a man to give up his fortune--a very
extreme thing--I can quite understand how the proposal looked to you
very monstrous at first--still, if you put that in the balance as
against a man's giving up his native country and the woman whom he is in
love with--don't you see--the happiness of people of so much more
importance than a sum of money, however large--"

"My dear fellow," said Brand, interrupting him, "there is no such
alternative--there never was any such alternative. Do you not think I
would rather give up twenty fortunes than have to go and bid good-bye to
Natalie? It is not a question of money. I suspected before--I know
now--that Lind never meant to let his daughter marry. He would not
definitely say no to me while he thought I could be persuaded about this
money business; as soon as I refused that, he was frank and explicit
enough. I see the whole thing clearly enough now. Well, he has not
altogether succeeded."

His eye happened to light on the ring on his finger, and the frown on
his face lifted somewhat.

"If I could only forget Lind; if I could forget why it was that I had to
go to America, I should think far less of the pain of separation. If I
could go to Natalie, and say, 'Look at what we must do, for the sake of
something greater than our own wishes and dreams,' then I think I could
bid her good-bye without much faltering; but when you know that it is
unnecessary--that you are being made the victim of a piece of personal
revenge--how can you look forward with any great enthusiasm to the new
life that lies before you? That is what troubles me, Evelyn."

"I cannot argue the matter with you," his friend said, looking down, and
evidently m