ve
chosen well and rightly.'

'I won't be so old-fashioned,' remarked Mr. Athel, still with subdued
sarcasm, 'as to hint that some thought of me might have entered into
your choosing' (did he consciously repeat his own father's words of
five-and-twenty years back, or was it but destiny making him play his
part in the human comedy?) 'and, in point of fact' (perhaps the parallel
touched him at this point), 'you are old enough to judge the affair on
its own merits. My wonder is that your judgment has not been sounder.
Has it occurred to you that a young lady in Miss Hood's position would
find it at all events somewhat difficult to be unbiassed in her assent
to what you proposed?'

'Nothing has occurred to me,' replied Wilfrid, more shortly than
hitherto, 'which could cast a shadow of suspicion on her perfect truth.
I beg that you will not suggest these things. Some day you will judge
her with better knowledge.'

'I am not sure of that,' was the rejoinder, almost irritably uttered.

'What do you mean by that, father?' Wilfrid asked in a lower tone.

'I mean, Wilf, that I am not yet in the frame of mind to regard the
children's governess as my daughter-in-law. Miss Hood may be all you
say; I would not willingly be anything but scrupulously just. The fact
remains that this is not the alliance which it became you to make. It
is, in a very pronounced sense, marrying beneath you. It is not easy for
me to reconcile myself to that.'

It was Wilfrid's turn to keep silence. What became of his plans? They
were hardly in a way to be carried out as he had conceived them. A
graver uneasiness was possessing him. Resolve would only grow by
opposition, but there was more of pain in announcing an independent
course than he had foreseen.

'What are your practical proposals?' his father inquired, his mollified
tone the result of observing that he had made a certain impression, for
he was distinctly one of the men who are to be overcome by yielding.

'I had a proposal to make, but of such a kind that it is hardly worth
while to speak of it. I shall have to reflect.'

'Let me hear what you were going to say. There's no harm in that, at all
events.'

'My idea was, that, with your consent and my aunt's, Miss Hood should
return just as if nothing had happened, and continue to teach the twins
till next summer, when I should have done with Oxford. There appears to
me to be nothing irrational or unseemly in such a plan. If she were our
c