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“I do not know,” replied the bishop, sadly; “I do not know. It may happen that whatever obstacle there has been which has kept you from her may be removed. It may be that she has married, it may be that she has fallen so low that you cannot marry her. But if you have loved her once, you may love her again; whatever it was that separated you in the past, that separates you now, that makes you prefer my daughter to her, may come to an end when you are married, when it will be too late, and when only trouble can come of it, and Ellen would bear that trouble. Can I risk that?”

“But I tell you it is impossible,” cried the young man. “The woman is beyond the love of any man, at least such a man as I am, or try to be.”

“Do you mean,” asked the bishop, gently, and with an eager look of hope, “that she is dead?”

Latimer faced the father for some seconds in silence. Then he raised his head slowly. “No,” he said, “I do not mean she is dead. No, she is not dead.”

Again the bishop moved back wearily into his chair. “You mean then,” he said, “perhaps, that she is a married woman?” Latimer pressed his lips together at first as though he would not answer, and then raised his eyes coldly. “Perhaps,” he said.

The older man had held up his hand as if to signify that what he was about to say should be listened to without interruption, when a sharp turning of the lock of the door caused both father and the suitor to start. Then they turned and looked at each other with anxious inquiry and with much concern, for they recognized for the first time that their voices had been loud. The older man stepped quickly across the floor, but before he reached the middle of the room the door opened from the outside, and his daughter stood in the door-way, with her head held down and her eyes looking at the floor.

“Ellen!” exclaimed the father, in a voice of pain and the deepest pity.

The girl moved toward the place from where his voice came, without raising her eyes, and when she reached him put her arms about him and hid her face on his shoulder. She moved as though she were tired, as though she were exhausted by some heavy work.

“My child,” said the bishop, gently, “were you listening?” There was no reproach in his voice; it was simply full of pity and concern.

“I thought,” whispered the girl, brokenly, “that he would be frightened; I wanted to hear what he would say. I thought I could laugh at him for it afterward. I did it for a joke. I thought–” she stopped with a little gasping sob that she tried to hide, and for a moment held herself erect and then sank back again into her father’s arms with her head upon his breast.

Latimer started forward, holding out his arms to her. “Ellen,” he said, “surely, Ellen, you are not against me. You see how preposterous it is, how unjust it is to me. You cannot mean–“

The girl raised her head and shrugged her shoulders slightly as though she were cold. “Father,” she said, wearily, “ask him to go away, Why does he stay? Ask him to go away.”

Latimer stopped and took a step back as though some one had struck him, and then stood silent with his face flushed and his eyes flashing. It was not in answer to anything that they said that he spoke, but to their attitude and what it suggested. “You stand there,” he began, “you two stand there as though I were something unclean, as though I had committed some crime. You look at me as though I were on trial for murder or worse. Both of you together against me. What have I done? What difference is there? You loved me a half-hour ago, Ellen; you said you did. I know you loved me; and you, sir,” he added, more quietly, “treated me like a friend. Has anything come since then to change me or you? Be fair to me, be sensible. What is the use of this? It is a silly, needless, horrible mistake. You know I love you, Ellen; love you better than all the world. I don’t have to tell you that; you know it, you can see and feel it. It does not need to be said; words can’t make it any truer. You have confused yourselves and stultified yourselves with this trick, this test by hypothetical conditions, by considering what is not real or possible. It is simple enough; it is plain enough. You know I love you, Ellen, and you only, and that is all there is to it, and all that there is of any consequence in the world to me. The matter stops there; that is all there is for you to consider. Answer me, Ellen, speak to me. Tell me that you believe me.”