"Hush, child! Hush, Emily!" Mrs. Owen felt it necessary to say at this moment. She had not before spoken a word, but she may have felt that that incarnation of reason and dignity, her husband, was "taking damage" at the hands of very ordinary mortals. "Hush, child--do not bandy words with your father." "No, miss, do not bandy words with _me_!" roared the Judge, put exactly upon the right track, from which he had before strayed a little, by the words of his wife. "_I_ am master in this house, as I mean to let you know!" Humble Judge!--he _had_ let them know it, long before, quite as much as lay in his power. "I will not allow myself to be run over in this manner, any longer!" Ponderous and self-sacrificing Judge!--apart from the fact that no one in that house had ever tried the experiment, what a vehicle it would have been that could "run over" that man without danger from the encounter! And now gathering strength and force as well as anger, as he rolled down the mountain of denunciation, he went on: "I have called you down, both of you, and you especially, Emily, to make a final settlement with you! I have told you before that you should marry Colonel John Boadley Bancker, and I need not tell you again, for by G--you _shall_! And now I tell you something more. If you ever permit that d--d low-lived, miserable, contemptible puppy, whom you call Frank Wallace, to cross the door-step of this house again, I will break every bone in his infernal carcase; and when he goes into the street, you go with him! Do you hear?" "Yes, father, I hear," said his daughter. "Yes, we both hear, as I suppose you intended it for both of us," said his sister. "I intended it for _everybody_!" roared the Judge. "Now let us see whether you obey or not! Come, Mrs. Owen, is supper ready?" Probably the Judge supposed that he had supplied both the others with quite as much supper as they needed, as he did not extend the invitation to either. He certainly had done so: they were both "full," in one sense of the word if not in the other. His daughter was "full" of trouble and anxiety; and Aunt Martha was "full" of a more dangerous feeling--outraged pride and indignation. "Poor Frank!--he cannot come to the house any more!" said the young girl, when they had left the parlor. "What shall I do? Aunt--Aunt--don't scold me, but I _love him_. That is the truth; and don't _you_ scold me, but help me if you can." "Until this hour, Emily," said the aunt, gravely, and taking the hand of her niece kindly in her own, "I had simply been determined that you should not be forced into a marriage with Colonel Bancker, if I could prevent it. Within this half hour I have made up my mind to go farther. I know that you love Frank Wallace; I believe him to be a good man, and I know him to be a brave one; and now you shall marry him, if any aid _I_ can offer will help you to that end!"