off.'

I went up to my father. His plight was more desperate than mine, for I
had resembled the condemned before the firing-party, to whom the expected
bullet brings a merely physical shock. He, poor man, heard his sentence,
which is the heart's pang of death; and how fondly and rootedly he had
clung to the idea of my marriage with the princess was shown in his
extinction after this blow.

My grandfather chose the moment as a fitting one to ask me for the last
time to take my side.

I replied, without offence in the tones of my voice, that I thought my
father need not lose me into the bargain, after what he had suffered that
day.

He just as quietly rejoined with a recommendation to me to divorce myself
for good and all from a scoundrel.

I took my father's arm: he was not in a state to move away unsupported.

My aunt Dorothy stood weeping; Janet was at the window, no friend to
either of us.

I said to her, 'You have your wish.'

She shook her head, but did not look back.

My grandfather watched me, step by step, until I had reached the door.