For he longed for the approval of his family on his choice, longed for them to love and admire pretty Floy as he did, longed to take her to the great stately home where she would be like a glancing sunbeam in the grand surroundings. He snatched the letter from its thick perfumed envelope, and his eager brown eyes glanced down the thickly-written pages penned by the hand of his beautiful, proud mother. How could she be so cruel to the boy she loved so dearly? Had she forgotten the tortured heart of Alva, that she could doom her son to a like anguish? Poor Alva--belle, beauty, and heiress--yet--_poor_ Alva! Whispering in her empty heart the name of one that died heart-broken for her sake! Yes, the pride of birth and wealth that had stood between Alva and her happiness now threatened shipwreck also to her brother’s bark of love. Mrs. Beresford, in a passion of imperious anger, denounced the weakness and folly of her son. She wrote, bitterly: “You are a man, and of course I can not forbid you from making the dreadful _mésalliance_ you contemplate, but I can say positively, from your father and myself, that should you persist in your determination to wed this nobody--whose very name you were ashamed to mention--you will cut yourself off from our love and recognition, and also from inheriting one penny of the Beresford millions. As you have nothing to look to but the small legacy you had from your grandfather, perhaps this will bring you to your senses. Doubtless it will cure that scheming adventuress of her fancy for you--some second-rate actress, at the best, I suppose--and you had as well advise her of the change in your prospects should you follow your insane desire to marry such a creature! Our determination on this point is unalterable.” Every scathing word sunk deep into her son’s heart, and with an inarticulate cry of anger and pain, he tore the offensive letter into ribbons, and cast it beneath his feet, trampling it as if it had been a living serpent. “I might have known it!” he cried, bitterly. “They did not spare poor Alva, and they will not spare me! But I am not a child as my sister was. I will show them I am made of sterner stuff!” He raged up and down the floor, his eyes blazing with insulted pride. Though he had destroyed the letter, he could see in his mind’s eye every offensive word standing out clearly, as though traced with a pen of fire. He muttered in savage wrath, blended with wounded pride: “Such cruel epithets--‘this nobody’--‘this scheming adventuress’--‘some second-rate actress’--‘such a creature’--oh, shame! that my lovely, innocent, pure-minded Floy should be insulted thus! Well, I will show them how I will come to my senses!” He threw himself down at a table with his face on his arm, his broad shoulders heaving with emotion.