"Oh, never! never in the world! When I was little, I traveled about with him, and I had the best time a child ever had. I was fêted, and carried on shoulders, and made much of because I was his daughter. Then I grew up and it all—changed." Her voice fell. She remembered the snare of the fowler, but that she could not tell him.
"Is he unkind to you now?"
"Never! it is unbroken kindness,—a benevolence, shall I call it? But it terrifies me. For under it all is that unbending will. And I keep hardening myself against it, and yet I know the time will come when he will have his way, because he is stronger than I."
"You must not let him be stronger than you. The birch bends, but it can resist."
"You don't know! If he were outwardly cruel, I could defy him. But he is like the sun that nourishes and then burns. He seems to have such life in himself, such great inborn power, no one can resist it. You almost feel as if you were going against natural laws when you go against him; and you know you'll be beaten because the laws are inevitable."
"That wasn't what you said of him that first night down in the shack."
"No! I scoffed at him then a little. He was so far away! Now I have been near him again and I tremble."
"But as you picture him, he's all good, all benevolence. You could convince a man like that."
"Never! He hasn't any soul. He is this great natural force that radiates power."
"Power!" echoed Osmond. "No wonder he's drunk on it. I could go down on my knees and worship it."