made?'

"'I shall remain here,' said she, firmly.

"I said nothing more. I saw that she was immovable. At the same time I
could not consent. I could not live with her, and I could not go away
leaving her there. I could not give up the ancestral home to her, to
mar and mangle and destroy. Well, I waited for about two months, and
then--"

"Well?" asked Hawbury, as Dacres hesitated.

"Dacres Grange was burned down," said the other, in a low voice.

"Burned down!"

"Yes."

"Good Lord!"

"It caught fire in the daytime. There were but few servants. No
fire-engines were near, for the Grange was in a remote place, and so
the fire soon gained headway and swept over all. My wife was frantic.
She came to me as I stood looking at the spectacle, and charged me
with setting fire to it. I smiled at her, but made no reply.

"So you see she was burned out, and that question was settled. It was
a terrible thing, but desperate diseases require desperate remedies;
and I felt it more tolerable to have the house in ruins than to have
her living there while I had to be a wanderer.