ask?"

She was not vividly impressed. "I suppose it may be hard, at first,"
she went on, casually, "but--"

He interrupted. "Hard! I am old--and poor. I have
nothing--nothing--but that little girl. All my whole life long I work
for her. My love for her has grown so close--close--close around my
heart that from my breast you could not tear it out without, at the
same time, tearing from that breast the heart itself. You hear,
Madame? She is my soul--my life--all I have got--all--all--"

"But am I not giving up a great deal, too? I had hoped my son would
marry well--perhaps, even, among the foreign nobility. That's what I
took him off to Europe with me for. I'm simply wild to be presented at
some court! Surely if I give all that up for my son's sake, you can do
as much, at least, for Anna's."

"As much? Why, what you ask of me, Madame, is to abandon all!"

Mrs. Vanderlyn became impatient. It seemed to her that he was most
unreasonable.

"I tell you that unless you do, I shall do nothing for them," she
cried petulantly. "My son has no idea of money. He's never had to earn
a dollar and he don't know how. They'll starve, if you don't yield,
and it will be your fault--entirely your fault."

Herr Kreutzer bowed his head. His heart cried out within him at the
horrible injustice of this woman, but, as he saw life, to yield was