With what threat could the noble Horatio terrify his daughter to
obedience? Before you talk of turning your rebellious child out of doors,
you must provide a home from which to cast her. Captain Paget remembered
this, and was for the moment reduced to sudden and ignominious silence.
And yet there must surely be some way of bringing this besotted young
woman to reason.
He sat for some minutes in silence, with his head leaning on his hand,
his face hidden from Diana. This silence, this attitude, so expressive of
utter despondency, touched her more keenly than his anger. She knew that
he was mean and selfish, that it was of his own loss he thought; and yet
she pitied him. He was old and helpless and miserable; so much the more
pitiable because of his selfishness and meanness. For the heroic soul
there is always some comfort; but for the grovelling nature suffering
knows no counterbalance. The ills that flesh is heir to seem utterly
bitter when there is no grand spirit to dominate the flesh, and soar
triumphant above the regions of earthly pain. Captain Paget's mind, to
him, was not a kingdom. He could not look declining years of poverty in
the face; he was tired of work. The schemes and trickeries of his life
were becoming very odious to him; they were for the most part worn out,
and had ceased to pay. Of course he had great hopes, in any event, from
Gustave Lenoble; but those hopes were dependent on Gustave's inheritance
of John Haygarth's estate.
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