deration to offer.

"And then," he began, "about--his mother. He must have
understood--something. He must know--by now."

"Know?" I returned. "If he does, he has the advantage over all the rest
of us. _I_ don't 'know.' _You_ don't 'know.' Neither does anybody else.
Another old matter--as well rectified as society and its usages can
manage, and best left alone."

"Well, it's--it's indelicate. Albert ought to feel that."

"Raymond!" I protested. "We must leave it to the young to smooth over
the rough old places and to salve the aching old sores. That's their
great use and function."

"Not Albert's," he said stubbornly. "I don't want him to do it, and I
don't want it done in that way."

Another silence. I could see that he was gathering force for still
another objection.

"It's a desertion," said the undying egoist. "It's a piece of treachery.
It's a going over to the enemy."

"If you mean McComas, Albert went over months ago. And he doesn't seem
to have lost anything by doing so," I ventured to add.

"This marriage would clinch it, would confirm it. I should lose him at
last, and completely, just as I have lost--everything."

"Raymond," I could scarcely keep from saying, "you deceive yourself. You
have really never cared for Albert at all. The only concern here is your
own pride--the futile working of a will that is too weak to get its own
way."

But I kept silence, and he continued the silence. Yet I felt that he
was gathering force for the greatest objection of all.

"I have heard them spoken of," he said, after a little, "as--as brother
and sister. For them to marry! It's unseemly."

"Raymond!" I protested again, with even more vigor than before. "Why
must you say a thing like that?"

"The same father and mother--now. Living together--going about together
as members of one family.... They did, you know."

"Yes, for a few weeks in the year. 'One family'? What is the mere label?
Nothing. What is the real situation? Everything. Of blood-relationship
not a trace. Why, even cousins marry--but here are two strains
absolutely different.... Have you," I asked, "have you brought up this
point with--Albert?"

Raymond glanced at the letters.

"You have! And he says what I say!"

Raymond put the letters away.

Albert had doubtless said much more--and said it with the vigor of
indignant youth.

VI

At a wedding the father of the bridegroom need not be conspicuous--least
of all when the wedding takes p