“I’m not concerned with the eyes of God,” said her husband in detached tones. “It’s perfectly evident to mine that if we don’t give our consent they mean to do without it, and I don’t choose to have my daughter making a runaway match. We had better give in gracefully while it is still possible, Bertha. Marleswood is not the sort of man to heal a breach, if it came to that.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean that we don’t want to be cut off from the little girl for ever after her marriage,” said Frederick, his voice shaking a very little. “That’s what it’ll mean if we let her go from under our roof in defiance, Bertha.”
“Hazel is an infatuated, self-willed child, but she is not heartless,” cried Bertha.
“I do not intend to put her to the test.” Frederick Tregaskis had regained his habitual dryness of utterance.
With unwonted consideration, he added a word of consolation for his wife.
“I may as well tell you that I am perfectly satisfied that Marleswood is a good fellow in every way, and devoted to her. The whole thing, after all, amounts to a question of conscience, which she is entitled to judge for herself.”
“She’s not,” flashed Bertha. “She’s only a child, and ought to accept the ruling of her parents until she’s old enough to judge for herself.”
“I have no doubt,” said Frederick drily, “that all parents, taken as a class, would agree with you. Unfortunately for ourselves, however, we have passed into an era where the individual, and not the class, will rule.”
He walked out of the room, looking older and more deeply lined than ever.