friends, Beth, and
begin all over again, as you once proposed. I am ready to leave Slane
and settle wherever you like. Make your own conditions; anything that
pleases you will please me."

This letter upset Beth very much. She would almost rather have had an
action for divorce brought against her than have been asked to return
to Daniel Maclure.

"Ought I to go back?" she asked, willing, with the fatuous persistency
of women in like cases, to persevere if it were thought right that
she should, although she knew pretty well that the sacrifice would be
unavailing so far as he was concerned, and would only entail upon
herself the common lot of women so mated--a ruined constitution and
corroded mind.

"Why does he suddenly so particularly wish it?" was the question.

The obvious explanation was indirectly conveyed in a letter from her
old lawyer. He had written to her in her London lodgings, first of
all, but the letter was returned from the Dead Letter Office. Then he
had written to Slane, but as he received no answer to that letter and
it was not returned, he went in person to inquire about it. Dan
declared that he knew nothing about the letter, or about Beth either,
if she had left London; but he thought her intimate friends the
Kilroys might know where she was. The old gentleman applied to the
Kilroys, and having found Beth, wrote to inform her that her
great-aunt Victoria Bench's investments had recovered at last, as he
had always been pretty sure that they would, and she would
accordingly, for the future, find herself in receipt of an income of
seven or eight hundred pounds a year. Dan's sudden magnanimity was
accounted for. Beth put his effusion and the lawyer's letter before
her friends, and asked to be advised. They decided unanimously that,
on the one hand, Dan was not a proper person for her to live with,
that no decent woman could associate with a man of his mind, habits,
and conversation without suffering injury in some sort; while, on the
other, they pointed out that, although it would be nice, it would not
be good for Dan to have the benefit of Beth's little income. While he
was forced to work, he would have to conduct himself with a certain
amount of propriety; but if Beth relieved him of the necessity, there
would be nothing to restrain him.

This episode roused Beth from her tranquil apathy, and made her think
of work once more. But first she had to settle somewhere and make a
home for herself; and