It was in great part to this admission of hers that the unwitting Dan Oliphant owed the family’s consent to his suit for the hand of a McMillan. A McMillan who got herself talked about, and then confessed, not in the manner of confession but with anger, that she had not been deceived—such a McMillan would conceivably do such a thing again, and a respectable barbarian bridegroom might be the best substitute for those unfortunately obsolete family resources in times of youthful revolt, _lettres de cachet_ and the enforced taking of veils. But, in good truth, Dan may have owed to Lena’s celebrated admission more than the family’s consent, for the family’s austerity of manner toward Lena became so protracted an oppression that she was the readier to be pleased with anything as cheerfully different from that family as Dan was. Without doubt, too, he owed it to this McMillan austerity that she did not write to him now and break her engagement with him. The Venable affair was two years past, but the austerity went on, unabated. Dan was at least an avenue of escape, and, as Lena had said to her brother, she was “a lot in love” with him. Yet she hesitated, angry with him because he could not offer what she wanted, and half convinced that escape from what she hated might be an escape into what she would hate more. So she wrote to him finally: You said you loved me! That isn’t quite easy to believe just now. Why did you let me go on counting upon our having a year abroad? I’m afraid I’ll never be able to understand it. I don’t know what to say or what to do. I think the best thing you could do would be to come East at once. Maybe I could understand better if we talked it over together. It seems to me that you couldn’t have cared for me with any depth or you wouldn’t have allowed things to be as you say they are. A man can always do anything he really wants to, and if you had _really_ wanted—oh, I know it’s futile to be writing of _that_! You simply didn’t care enough, and I thought you did! The only thing for you to do is to come at once. We must settle what’s to be done, because I can’t go on in the state of unhappiness I’ve suffered since your last letter. Maybe you can convince me that you do care a little in spite of having forced me to give up what I counted on. If you do convince me, I suppose there’s no use putting off things—I don’t want a large, fussy wedding. If we _are_ going ahead with it, we might as well get it over. I don’t know what to do, I admit that; but I’m still _Your_ half-heartbroken LENA. CHAPTER IX