"You have won the heart of my daughter," he began. "She is the image of her mother, and the man who has such a love has all the world can give that is worth having. I congratulate you, sir. For her sake I must make your cause my own. You have helped me free my sons; you must help me save my daughter. She could not survive your downfall--I know that because I knew her mother. Tell me, as a man facing a man, are these charges true?" "They are not. I swear they are not." "Thank God! That is all I want to know!" Rowland held out his hand and, taking that of Charles, he pressed it tightly. He was about to withdraw in his stately way when Charles drew him back. "Wait," he faltered. "As I've said, these charges are wholly unfounded, but under the circumstances it is my duty to you to tell you what your daughter has failed to mention, and that is that there are things in my life which I have pledged my honor never to reveal--things concerning others more than myself--" "Then don't mention them," Rowland said, firmly. "Do your duty as you see it and God will take care of you. I have suspected that you may be keeping back something, but that is your right. Now let's go in to supper. But wait a moment. I want to speak of something psychological. Do you know that a man of my age can be turned from almost a lifelong purpose in an instant? You have seen me working on that ponderous genealogy of mine. Well, the other day when my boys were in so much danger my daughter and I were alone in my room. She looked very sad, and all at once it seemed to me that she was an exact reproduction of her mother when we were married. You know in that day when I brought my young wife here we had everything our hearts desired in the way of luxury, comfort, and even what was then considered style. Now it is all gone and we are poor. This change, I reckon, has pained me more than it has my daughter, and I have clung to the past and tried to keep it alive. One of the ways of keeping it alive has been my thinking and writing about the dignity and superiority of my ancestors. I was getting my book ready to hand down to my children and their children, and I would have finished it and published it but for my daughter. On the day I spoke of just now, I happened to tell her that I was thinking of borrowing some money to pay for the printing, when I saw from her face that she wasn't pleased. I asked her what was the matter, and she came and sat on my knee, sir, as she had done as a little child, and as--as her mother had done as a bride. She put her arm around my neck and kissed me, and then she begged my forgiveness for saying what she felt that she ought to say. She pointed out that she and her brothers belonged to a different age from the one I'd passed through. As she saw it, life was too grim and serious for one to foster pride in one's ancestors simply because they, being men and women of gentility, wealth, and influence, had stood higher than others. Mary cried as she begged