Even as she spoke she sank sobbing, no longer on to his breast, no longer with her arms clasped round his neck, but at his feet.

He raised her in his arms—­for he loved her with passionate love.

“Madaline,” he said, in a low voice, “do not make my task harder for me.  That which I have to do is indeed bitter to me—­do not make it harder.”

His appeal touched her.  For his sake she must try to be strong.

Slowly he looked up at the long line of noblemen and women whose faces shone down upon him; slowly he looked at her graceful figure and bowed head of his wife, the daughter of a felon—­the first woman who had ever entered those walls with even the semblance of a stain upon her name.  As he looked at her the thought came to him that, if his housekeeper had told him that she had inadvertently placed such a person—­the daughter of a felon—­in his kitchen, he would never have rested until she had been sent away.

He must part from her—­this lovely girl-wife whom he loved with such passionate love.  The daughter of a criminal could not reign at Beechgrove.  If the parting cost his life and hers it must take place.  It was cruel.  The strong man trembled with agitation; his lips quivered, his face was pale as death.  He bent over his weeping wife.

“Madaline,” he said, gently, “I do not understand the ways of destiny.  Why you and I have to suffer this torture I cannot say.  I can see nothing in our lives that deserves such punishment.  Heaven knows best.  Why we have met and loved, only to undergo such anguish, is a puzzle I cannot solve.  There is only one thing plain to me, and that is that we must part.”

He never forgot how she sprang away from him, her colorless face raised to his.

“Part, Norman!” she cried.  “We cannot part now; I am your wife!”

“I know it; but we must part.”

“Part!” repeated the girl.  “We cannot; the tie that binds us cannot be sundered so easily.”

“My poor Madaline, it must be.”

She caught his hand in hers.

“You are jesting, Norman.  We cannot be separated—­we are one.  Do you forget the words—­’for better for worse,’ ’till death us do part?’—­You frighten me!” And she shrank from him with a terrible shudder.

“It must be as I have said,” declared the unhappy man.  “I have been deceived—­so have you.  We have to suffer for another’s sin.”

“We may suffer,” she said, dully, “but we cannot part.  You cannot send me away from you.”

“I must,” he persisted.  “Darling, I speak with deepest love and pity, yet with unwavering firmness.  You cannot think that, with that terrible stain resting on you, you can take your place here.”

“But I am your wife!” she cried, in wild terror.

“You are my wife,” he returned, with quivering lips; “but you must remain so in name only.”  He paused abruptly, for it seemed to him that the words burned his lips as they passed them.  “My wife,” he muttered, “in name only.”