exchange for her daughter's hand.

"Of course, Mrs. Tresslyn, I know that Anne loves me," he said, with
forced calmness. "She doesn't love my grandfather. That isn't even
debatable. I fear that I am the only person in the world who does love
him. I suspect, too, that if he loves any one, I am that one. If you think
that he is fool enough to believe that Anne loves him, you are vastly
mistaken. He knows perfectly well that she doesn't, and, by gad, he
doesn't blame her. He understands. That's why he sits there at home and
chuckles. I hope you will not mind my saying to you that he considers me a
very lucky person."

"Lucky?" said she, momentarily off her guard.

"If you care to hear exactly how he puts it, he says I'm _damned_ lucky,
Mrs. Tresslyn. Of course, you are not to assume that I agree with him. If
I thought all this was Anne's doing and not yours, I should say that I am
lucky, but I can't believe—good heavens, I will not believe that she could
do such a thing! A young, beautiful, happy girl voluntarily—oh, it is
unspeakable! She is being driven into it, she is being sacrificed to—"

"Just one moment, Braden," interrupted Mrs. Tresslyn, curtly. "I may as
well set you quite straight in the matter. It will save time and put an
end to recriminations. My daughter does not care the snap of her fingers
for Mr. Thorpe. I think she loves you quite as dearly now as she ever did.
At any rate, she says she does. But that is neither here nor there. She is
going to marry Mr. Thorpe, and of her own volition. I have advised her to
do so, I will admit, but I have not driven her to it, as you say. No one
but a fool would expect her to love that old man. He doesn't ask it of
her. He simply asks her to marry him. Nowadays people do not always marry