But his stricken aspect touched me. Now that he was prepared to come to his knees, I had no heart to force him down on them. Since I had gained my point, it was foolish to battle on, or try to make the Ethiopian change his skin. "Oh, sir, you've said it!" I cried, with sudden emotion. I leaned toward him, clasping my hands. "I see you do want me; and since you do I'll--I'll come." Having made this concession, I became humble and thankful and tactful. I appeased him by saying I was sensible of the honor he did me, that I was happy in the thought that he was to be reconciled with Hugh; and I inquired for Mrs. Brokenshire. Leading up to this question with an air of guilelessness, I got the answer I was watching for in the ashen shade that settled on his face. I forget what he replied; I was really not listening. I was calling up the scene in which she must have fulfilled her promise of helping Hugh and me. From the something crushed in him, as in the case of a man who knows the worst at last, I gathered that she had made a clean breast of it. It was awesome to think that behind this immaculate white suit with its violet details, behind this pink of the old beau, behind this moneyed authority and this power of dictation to which even the mighty sometimes had to bow, there was a broken heart. He knew now that the bird he had captured was nothing but a captured bird, and always longing for the forest. That his wife was willing to bear his name and live in his house and submit to his embraces was largely because I had induced her. Whether or not, in spite of his pompousness, he was grateful to me I didn't know; but I guessed that he was not. He could accept such benefits as I had secured him and yet be resentful toward the curious providence that had chosen me in particular as its instrument. I came out of my meditations in time to hear him say that, Mrs. Brokenshire being as well rested as she was, there would be no further hindrance to their proceeding soon to Newport. "And I suppose I might go back to my home," I observed, with no other than the best intentions. He made an attempt to regain the authority he had just forfeited. "What for?" "To be married," I explained--"since I am to be married." "But why should you be married there?" "Wouldn't it be the most natural thing?" "It wouldn't be the most natural thing for Hugh." "A man can be married anywhere; whereas a woman, at such a turning-point in her life, needs a certain backing. I've an uncle and aunt and a great many friends--" The effort at a faint smile drew up the corner of his mouth and set his face awry. "You'll excuse me, my dear"--the epithet made me jump--"if I correct you on a point of taste. In being willing that Hugh should marry you I think I must draw the line at anything like parade." I know my eyebrows went up. "Parade? Parade--how?" The painful little smile persisted.