Before her transformation she would have been shocked beyond measure at so wicked a falsehood, as she then decided to launch. Impelled by a consuming desire for revenge, no blush of shame checked her mad course, and "no still small voice" warned her of her sin. She said: "John, if our family honor is to be protected from scandal, you will prevent your niece from having further to do with Mr. Corway." Both John and Hazel turned toward her. A deep silence ensued. Implicit trust and confidence, the confidence begotten in perfect domestic peace and contentment, had followed John Thorpe--but now, for the first time, he found a tinge of shame and indignation had crept into his heart--and he could not banish it. At last he gravely broke the silence--"Have you no answer to this, Hazel?" The girl's eyes flashed resentment, but she refrained from angry expression, for to her uncle she always showed the greatest deference, yet her voice trembled a little as she said, with girlish dignity: "I decline to reply to such an absurdity." "Hazel!" warned Virginia, "you are dangerously near ruin when in the company of that man, for his reputation is anything but clean." Again a painful silence followed, Hazel, appearing incapable of clearly understanding just what it was all about, stood dumb with astonishment, while John's varied emotions were seen plainly through the thin veneer of tranquility he tried to maintain. John Thorpe was jealous of the honor of his house. The mere thought of its possible violation bruised and lacerated him. Proud of his high position in society; proud of his high rectitude; proud of his father's untarnished life; proud of the fact that not the faintest shadow of scandal could ever attach to his house or name--the hinted criminations of his his orphan niece, maintained in his home as one of the family, beat upon him with much the same effect as the horrifying wings of a bat upon the face of a frightened child. Virginia saw and felt that the crisis of her ruse was near. Again a flush of daring sprang into her eyes, ominous of deeper sin, but John unconsciously spared her from further commitment. Doubt was master at last, for he chose to lean toward Virginia. "Hazel!" he exclaimed, his white, grave face betraying a keen sense of his shame. "Your rash fondness for that man is a sacrifice of affection, and I shall forbid him visiting our house." "A wise precaution," commented Virginia. At last Hazel's indignation broke through all restraint. "I am astonished at your implications," she retorted, her voice becoming pathetic with the sense of her wounded honor. "My 'rash fondness'! Uncle!" and she drew her slight form up erect, her eyes flashing defiance: "If to believe in Mr. Corway's preferment is a sacrifice of affection, then that sacrifice is to me an exalted honor, for I have consented to become his wife!" "Hazel!" gasped John Thorpe, amazed and dismayed at her declaration.