But in the face of those grave words it was impossible to say it. It would be no benefit to her to take her out, and die before they got to the end of the journey. Isobel met him in the hall of their pretty little home, half villa, half cottage. "Why, where in the world have you been?" she cried, "running away at this early hour of the morning?" They lived such an intimate and domestic life, that it was almost a point of honour to give notice of each other's movements. The General was a bad dissembler. He blurted it all out at once. "To tell you the truth, I wanted to take you out to Spain. I went round to see Jones, to learn what he said about it. He forbids it." She looked at him anxiously. Yes, he seemed to have aged even the last week. A spasm of reproach shot through her that she had not been quicker to notice his failing health. Guy had usurped her thoughts too much. "But I don't think it will be difficult to arrange. I can soon get hold of some female dragon, some elderly chaperon who will take you." The girl's eyes filled with tears. Not for the first time did she appreciate that unselfish parental love, the love that gives everything, and asks so little in return. She kissed him very tenderly. "No, no, a thousand times no, you kindest of all kind fathers. Until you get well and strong again, I would not leave you for a thousand lovers." He patted her hand. He was the most unselfish of men, but it pleased him very much to hear her say that much. The stranger who had come into her life was not going to oust the old father from his place in her heart. "We have been so much to each other, little girl, since your dear mother died, have we not?" he asked gently. "More than so much," she whispered back. "Oh, more than so much. We have been everything to each other." At that moment even her lover was almost forgotten. A few hours later, she stole out of the house, and called on the doctor. "My father is worse," she said impetuously, when she entered the consulting-room. Doctor Jones looked very grave. "My dear child, he is as bad as he can be. I have warned you before. The end may come at any moment." "And yet it only seems yesterday that he was out shooting--of course I know it is months ago--and when he came back, I used to ask him if he was tired, and he always told me he never felt more fit in his life. And a big, strong man in appearance! A few weeks ago he did not look his age." "It is frequently the way with this particular disease," was the doctor's reply. "They hang on for years, with a sort of spurious energy, and then, all of a sudden, they go--snap." "Will he suffer much, do you think?" asked Isobel, bravely keeping back the tears. "Don't trouble yourself about that. He will go out like the snuff of a candle. Take my word for it, he will not suffer."