Henry Houghton took his girl's hand, and held it in a grip that hurt her. "Maurice is right," he said; "things are _not_ going to be easy for him. For, though he won't marry Jacky's mother, he won't, I think, marry anybody else." "Why won't he?" said Edith. "There is no _moral_ reason why he shouldn't," her father conceded; "it is a question of taste; one might perhaps call it a question of honor"--Maurice whitened, but Henry Houghton went on, calmly, "Maurice will, of necessity, be so involved with this woman--and God knows what annoyances she may make for him, that--it distresses me to say so--but I can see that he will not feel like asking any woman to share such a burden as he has to carry." "If he loves any woman," Edith said, "let him ask her! If she turns him down, it stamps her for a coward!" "Don't you think I'm right, Maurice?" her father said. "Yes," Maurice said. "You are right. I've faced that." Edith sprang to her feet, and stood looking at her father and mother, her eyes stern with protecting passion. "It seems to me absurd," she said,--"like standing up so straight you fall over backward!--for Maurice to feel he can't marry--somebody else, just because he--he did wrong, ever so many years ago! He's sorry, now. Aren't you sorry, Maurice?" she said. His eyes stung;--the simplicity of the word was like a flower tossed into the black depths of his repentance! "Yes, dear," he said, gently; "I'm 'sorry.' But no amount of 'sorrow' can alter consequences, Edith." "Oh," she said, turning to the other two, "don't you want Maurice _ever_ to be happy?" "I want him to be good," said her mother. "I can't be happy, Edith," Maurice told her; "don't you see?" She looked straight in his eyes, her own eyes terror-stricken. ... They would drive him away from her! "You _shall_ be happy," she said. They saw only each other, now. "No," Maurice said; "it's just as your father says; I have no right to drag any girl into the kind of life I've got to live. I'll have to see Lily a good deal, so as to keep in with her--and be able to look after Jacky. Personal happiness is all over for me." She caught at his arm; "It isn't! Maurice, don't listen to them!" Then she turned and stood in front of him, as though to put her young breast between him and that tender, menacing parental love. "Oh, mother--oh, father! I _do_ love you; I don't want to do anything you don't approve of;--but Maurice comes first. If he asks me to marry him, I will." Under his breath Maurice said, "_Edith!_" "My darling," Henry Houghton said, "consider: people are bound to know all about this. The publicity will be a very painful embarrassment--" Edith broke in, "As if that matters!" "But the serious thing," her father went on, "Is that this woman will be a millstone around his neck--"