'Humanly speaking I think their chances of happiness are greater than that of any one. I know that they are so admirably suited to each other. Aunt Milly will give him just the rest he needs.'
'I should not be surprised if he will forget all his bitter past then. But, Richard, I want to speak to you; you have not seen my father lately?'
'Not for months,' he replied, startled at the change in her tone; all at once it took a thin, harassed note.
'He has decided to stand for the Kendal election, though more than one of his best friends have prophesied a certain defeat. Richard, I cannot help telling you that I dread the result.'
'You must try not to be uneasy,' he returned, with that unconscious softening in his voice that made it almost caressing. 'You must know by this time how useless it is to try to shake his purpose.'
'Yes, I know that,' she returned, dejectedly; 'but all the same I feel as though he were contemplating suicide. He is throwing away time and money on a mere chimera, for they say the Radical member will be returned to a certainty. If he should be defeated'—pausing in some emotion.
'Oh, he must take his chance of that.'
'You do not know; it will break him down entirely. He has set his heart on this thing, and it will go badly with both of us if he be disappointed. Last night it was dreadful to hear him talk. More than once he said that failure would be social death to him. It breaks my heart to see him looking so ill and yet refusing any sympathy that one can offer him.'
'Yes, I understand; if I could only help you,' he returned, in a suppressed voice.
'No one can do that—it has to be borne,' was the dreary answer; and just then the lodge gates of Kirkleatham came in sight.