"Divorce!" said Mrs. Dennistoun. "Elinor----! To drag her private affairs before the world. Oh, John, John, that could not be. You would not wish that to be." "I!" he cried with a laugh of tuneless mirth. "Is it likely that I would wish to drag Elinor before the world?" Elinor did not say anything, but withdrew one hand from her burning cheek and put it into his. These women treated John as if he were a man of wood. What he might be feeling, or if he were feeling anything, did not enter their minds. "It was like her," said Elinor after a time in a low hurried voice, "to think of that. She is the only one who would think of it. As if I had ever thought or dreamed----" "It is possible, however," he said, "that it might be reasonable enough. I don't speak to Elinor," who had let go his hand hastily, "but to you, aunt. If it is altogether final, as she says, to be released would perhaps be better, from a bond that was no bond." "John, John, would you have her add shame to pain?" "The shame would not be to her, aunt." "The shame is to every one concerned--to every one! My Elinor's name, her dear name, dragged through all that mud! She a party, perhaps, to revelations--Oh, never, never! We would bear anything rather." "This of course," said John, "is perhaps a still more bitter punishment for the other side." She looked round at him again. Looking up with a look of pale horror, her eyelids in agonised curves over her eyes, her mouth quivering. "What did you say, John?" "I said it might be a more bitter punishment still for--the other side." Elinor lifted up her baby to her breast, raising herself with a new dignity, with her head high. "I meant no punishment," she said, "I want none. I have left--what killed me--behind me; many things, not one only. I have brought my boy away that he may never--never-- But if it would be better that--another should be free--" "I will never give my consent to it, Elinor." "Nor I with my own mind; but if it is vindictive--if it is revenge, mother! I am not alone to think of myself. If it were better for ---- that he should be free; speak to John about it and tell me. I cannot, cannot discuss it. I will leave it all to John and you. It will kill me! but what does that matter?--it is not revenge that I seek." She turned with the baby pressed to her breast and walked away, her every movement showing the strain and excitement of her soul. "Why did you do this, John, without at least consulting me? You have thrown a new trouble into her mind. She will never, never do this thing--nor would I permit it. There are some things in which I must take a part. I could not forbid her marriage; God grant that I had had the strength to do it--but this I will forbid, to expose her to the whole world, when everything we have done has been with the idea of concealing what had happened. Never, never. I will never consent to it, John."