I set my teeth, and clasped both arms round Mary as he spoke. I
had inherited some of his temper, and he was now to know it.

"Two!" proceeded my father, after waiting a little.

Mary put her trembling lips to my ear, and whispered: "Let me go,
George! I can't bear to see it. Oh, look how he frowns! I know
he'll hurt you."

My father lifted his forefinger as a preliminary warning before
he counted Three.

"Stop!" cried Dame Dermody.

My father looked round at her again with sardonic astonishment.

"I beg your pardon, ma'am--have you anything particular to say to
me?" he asked.

"Man!" returned the Sibyl, "you speak lightly. Have I spoken
lightly to You? I warn you to bow your wicked will before a Will
that is mightier than yours. The spirits of these children are
kindred spirits. For time and for eternity they are united one to
the other. Put land and sea between them--they will still be
together; they will communicate in visions, they will be revealed
to each other in dreams. Bind them by worldly ties; wed your son,
in the time to come, to another woman, and my grand-daughter to
another man. In vain! I tell you, in vain! You may doom them to
misery, you may drive them to sin--the day of their union on
earth is still a day predestined in heaven. It will come! it will
come! Submit, while the time for submission is yours. You are a
doomed man. I see the shadow of disaster, I see the seal of
death, on your face. Go; and leave these consecrated ones to walk
the dark ways of the world together, in the strength of their
innocence, in the light of their love. Go--and God forgive you!"
In spite of himself, my father was struck by the irresistible
strength of conviction which inspired those words. The bailiff's
mother had impressed him as a tragic actress might have impressed
him on the stage. She had checked the mocking answer on his lips,
but she had not shaken his iron will. His face was as hard as
ever when he turned my way once more.

"The last chance, George, " he said, and counted the last number:
"Three!"

I neither moved nor answered him.

"You _will_ have it?" he said, as he fastened his hold on my arm.

I fastened _my_ hold on Mary; I whispered to her, "I won't leave
you!" She seemed not to hear me. She trembled from head to foot
in my arms. A faint cry of terror fluttered from her lips.
Dermody instantly stepped forward. Before my father could wrench
me away from her, he had said in my ear, "You can give her to
_me_, Master George," and had released his child from my embrace.
She stretched her little frail hands out yearningly to me, as she
lay in Dermody's arms. "Good-by, dear," she said, faintly. I saw
her head sink on her father's bosom as I was dragged to the door.
In my helpless rage and misery, I struggled against the cruel
hands that had got me with all the strength I had left. I cried
out to her, "I love you, Mary! I will come back to you, Mary! I
will never marry any one but you!" Step by step, I was forced
further and further away. The last I saw of her, my darling's
head was still resting on Dermody's breast. Her grandmother stood
near, and shook her withered hands at my father, and shrieked her
terrible prophecy, in the hysteric frenzy that possessed her when
she saw the separation accomplished. "Go!--you go to your ruin!
you go to your death!" While her voice still rang in my ears, the
cottage door was opened and closed again. It was all over. The
modest world of my boyish love and my boyish joy disappeared like
the vision of a dream. The empty outer wilderness, which was my
father's world, opened before me void of love and void of joy.
God forgive me--how I hated him at that moment!

CHAPTER IV.

THE CURTAIN FALLS.

FOR the rest of the day, and through the night, I was kept a
close prisoner in my room, watched by a man on whose fidelity my
father could depend.

The next morning I made an effort to escape, and was discovered
before I had got free of the house. Confined again to my room, I
contrived to write to Mary, and to slip my note into the willing
hand of the housemaid who attended on me. Useless! The vigilance
of my guardian was not to be evaded. The woman was suspected and
followed, and the letter was taken from her. My father tore it up
with his own hands.

Later in the day, my mother was permitted to see me.

She was quite unfit, poor soul, to intercede for me, or to serve
my interests in any way. My father had completely overwhelmed her
by announcing that his wife and his son were to accompany him,
when he returned to America.

"Every farthing he has in the world," said my mother, "is to be
thrown into that hateful speculation. He has raised money in


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