their money; the most scrupulous of matrons are talked out of
their virtue; the most experienced of statesmen are talked out of
their principles. And who can really calculate chances? Men who
lead forlorn hopes generally push through without being wounded;
--and the fifth or sixth heir comes to a title.' So much he
said, palpably, though to himself with his inner voice. Then--
impalpably, with no even inner voice,--he asked himself what
chance he might have of prevailing with the girl herself; and he
almost ventured to tell himself that in that direction, he need
not despair.

In very truth he loved the girl and reverenced her, believing her
to be better and higher and nobler than other human beings,--as
a man does when he is in love; and so believing, he had those
doubts as to his own success which such reverence produces.



CHAPTER 3

MR ABEL WHARTON Q.C.

Lopez was not a man to let grass grow under his feet when he had
anything to do. When he was tired of walking backwards and
forwards over the same bit of pavement, subject all the while to
a cold east wind, he went home and thought of the same matter
while he lay in bed. Even were he to get the girl's assurances
of love, without her father's consent he might find himself
farther from his object than ever. Mr Wharton was a man of old
fashions, who would think himself ill-used and his daughter ill-