"Let them," he thought, for louder at that moment than any other voice was the voice that cried,
"Do the right!"
The marriage need not take place immediately. Bessie could be educated. She was bright; there was no saying how quickly she might develop. That would soften the blow to his father, and anyhow the Deemster would see that he was trying to be true to his blood, his race.
"Yes, yes, I must do the right; whatever it may cost me."
But then came another chilling thought. Love! There could be no love in such a marriage. This brought, with the pain of a bleeding wound, the memory of Fenella.
In spite of all he had said to himself through so many years he had never really been reconciled to the loss of her. Down in some dark and secret chamber of his consciousness there had always been a phantom hope that notwithstanding her devotion to her work for women, and the dedication to celibacy (as stern as the consecration of the veil) which she believed to be demanded by it, Fenella would return to the island, and his great love would be rewarded.
That had been the real cause of his idleness. He had been waiting, waiting, waiting for Fenella to come back and make it worth while .... and now .... by his own act .... the consequences of it .... Oh, God! Oh, God!
For the first time, save once since he was a child, he felt tears in his eyes, but he brushed them away impatiently.
"It's too late to think of that now," he thought.
A duty claimed him. He must put such dreams away. Besides where was the merit of doing the right if you had not to sacrifice something? Love might be the light of life, but men and women all the world over had for one reason or other to marry without it. Millions of hearts in all ages were like old battlefields, with dead things, which nobody knew of, lying about in the dark places. And yet the world went on.