went on, gazing
fixedly at him with the most frigid coldness, "This Lilias is the
daughter of your favorite brother, is she not? I presume she will be the
fortunate individual on whom your choice will probably fall.
Henceforward, then, it may be a pleasant subject of speculation for me,
whether this girl, whom you have never so much as seen, will vouchsafe a
crust of bread to your widow, and a garret to shelter her in the home
she shared with you."

He writhed under these bitter words, and wrung his withered hands. He
spoke with moaning voice, like that of a child in pain--"Catherine,
Catherine, it is yourself who have forced me to it. You know how,
living, all that I have is yours,--my whole wealth utterly at your
command; dying, as soon I must, how thankful would I leave all I possess
to you; yes, thankful should I be to think that from the very grave my
love had still the power to benefit and bless you--if you would but give
me the pledge I ask. You know how from this overwhelming affection which
I have given you these long, interminable years, there has been born a
hate deeper, deeper even than its parent love, for it constrains me
rather to endure the bitterness of your reproaches, the agony of leaving
you destitute on earth, than consent that even one inch of my property,
one penny of my wealth, should pass from your hands to the offspring of
the man I have abhorred."

"Yes! and to have so abhorred him, the best and noblest of his kind--and
now to hate his helpless child--I tell you, you can have no heart of man
within you, but the very nature of a tiger, cruel and crafty. A deadly
hate it must be, truly, which can pursue a man into his very rest of
death, and wound the poor corpse in the person of his son. Oh! how could
you abhor him--you who have seen him in his living grace and goodness?"

"Because he loved you," almost shrieked the old man; "and oh,
Catherine, my wife, so long and vainly dear, because you loved him
also."

"I did, and do," she exclaimed, weeping passionate tears; "oh! how I
love him still, my first, my only choice, the husband of my youth, the
father of my child. You thought I should forget him, did you, in the
midst of all this luxury? I tell you I love his green and narrow grave,
with the dead ashes it contains, ten thousandfold better than this
palace home and the living husband within it." The withering scorn with
which she uttered these last words seemed to madden him.

"What, you