His memory rested with bitterness on the fact that he had feared to lift the curtain on Nan's character at one point in their final struggle over this marriage. He had fought with desperation to win and hold her heart, but he had fought fairly. There had always been a way--he might have won by the sacrifice of character. He had not offered to yield his ideal, accept her views, and change his life purpose. The act would have been dishonourable only to his own sense of right. He would have done exactly what Bivens asked. He had never questioned this decision to the day of her wedding. But when the fateful morning came he was stunned by the feeling of incredible despair which crept into his heart. The day was chill and damp. Dull, grayish, half-black clouds rolled over the city from the sea--clouds that hung low and wet over the cold pavements without breaking into rain. He knew that Nan was as superstitious as the old black mammy of the South who had nursed her. Aunt Sallie had come to New York for the wedding of her "baby," and Stuart could hear her now crooning over the sayings of wedding days: "Marry in May you'll rue the day; marry in Lent you'll live to repent----" "Monday for wealth, Tuesday for health, Wednesday best of all; Thursday for crosses, Friday for losses, and Saturday no luck at all." It was Monday, and Nan must have known it when she fixed the day--but there was another important saying he recalled now: "Happy is the bride the sun shines on----" Perhaps these lowering clouds and the coming storm might cause her to hesitate and postpone the marriage. All morning he sat brooding by his window, watching the swaying branches of the trees in the Square--and though he knew at best that he was a fool--confidently expecting the miracle of a message. As the hour of noon approached, despair slowly settled over his heart. How could he reconcile himself to the horrible reality? This woman and the dreams of her had become part of his very being. The memory of his hopes began to strangle him--the wonderful life they were to live together, whose pictured scenes stretched out now before him--of home, of love, of motherhood and fatherhood hallowed by adoration, the pain, the glory, the passion, the tenderness, the sanctity, the mystery of it all--and this the end. A marriage sordid, cold, vulgar to such a man--this little tobacco-stained, bead-eyed weasel. And she had talked to him about her career. As if she didn't know that the career of any woman was immeasurably grander than that of any man--if she fulfil her destiny that links her to God in the creation of a child--a being whose simple word may mould a million wills and change the fate of centuries--and yet she had deliberately strangled her soul and chosen this little pig, who rooted in the dirt for gold, to be the father of her children. He rose, breathing hard and brushed a tear from his eye--a tear that had come unbidden in spite of his iron will.