They drew apart. "We shall never speak of this matter again," she said tremulously. She held out her hand. "Good-bye ... father. I shall see you again—yes. But this is the real good-bye."
He took her hand. "Good-bye," he said.
They gazed steadily into each other's eyes. "Good-bye," she repeated in a low voice, and, head down, walked slowly from the room.
He sat long before the fire while upon him his new situation pressed more heavily, more sharply. It was the bitterest hour of his life. Upon him bore the pain of impending public disgrace, the pain of the loss of his daughter—and cruellest of all, the pain of being judged by the one person of his heart, disowned by her. And this last bitterness was given a deep-cutting, ironic edge as he realised afresh that, to protect himself, he must disown her—that, cast off by her, he must make it appear to the world that he had cast her off.
And how the world would take this! His imagination saw in the papers of some near day, across the first page in great black head-lines, "Miss Helen Chambers Marries Ex-Convict—Disowned and Disinherited By Her Father—Social World Horrified!" The irony of it!
But even in this hour, pained as he was by Helen's judgment, he felt no regret for those deeds for which he had been judged. For thirty years and more he had had one supreme object—to take from life, for himself, all that life could be made to yield. All his faculties were pointed to, attuned to, acquisition. His instinct, his long habit, his mighty will, his opportunity-making mind, his long succession of successes, the irresistible command of his every cell to go on, and on, and on—all these united in a momentum that allowed him neither to recoil from what he had done nor to regard it with regret. He felt pain, yes—but mixed with his pain was no other feeling, no impulse, that would swerve his life even a single degree from its thirty-years' direction.