Then Maria’s strange calm broke up.  She clung, weeping, to her father, as if he were her only stay.  Harry continued to soothe her.

“Father’s blessing!” he whispered in her ear.  “She was the best little girl that ever was.  She is just like her own dear mother.”

“I wish mother was back,” Maria whispered, her whisper stifled against his ear.

“Oh, my God, so do I!” Harry said, with a half sob.  For the minute the true significance of his position overwhelmed him.  He felt a regret, a remembrance, that was a passion.  He realized, with no disguise, what it all meant:  that he a man with the weakness of a child in the hands of a masterly woman, had formerly been in the leading-strings of love for himself, for his own best good, whereas he was now in the grasp of the self-love of another who cared for him only as he promoted her own interests.  In a moment, however, he recovered himself.  After all, he had a sense of loyalty and duty which amounted to positive strength.  He put Maria gently from him with another kiss.

“Well, this won’t bring your mother back, dear,” he said, “and God took her away, you know, and what He does is for the best; and She means to do her duty by you, you know, dear.  She thought it would be better for you, but father can’t spare you, that’s all there is about it.”

Chapter XIII

It was an utter impossibility for Ida Edgham to be entirely balked of any purpose which she might form.  There was something at once impressive and terrible about the strength of this beautiful, smiling creature’s will, about its silence, its impassibility before obstacles, its persistency.  It was as inevitable and unswervable as an avalanche or a cyclone.  People might shriek out against it and struggle, but on it came, a mighty force, overwhelming petty things as well as great ones.  It really seemed a pity, taking into consideration Ida’s tremendous strength of character, that she had not some great national purpose upon which to exert herself, instead of such trivial domestic ones.

Ida realized that she could not send Maria to the school which she had proposed.  Her strength had that subtlety which acknowledges its limitations and its closed doors, and can look about for other means and ways.  Therefore, when Harry came down-stairs that Sunday afternoon, his face working with emotion but his eyes filled with a steady light, and said, with no preface, “It’s no use talking, Ida, that child does not want to go, and she shall never be driven from under my roof, while I live,” Ida only smiled, and replied, “Very well, dear, I only meant it for her good.”

“She is not going,” Harry said doggedly.

Harry resumed his seat with a gesture of defiance which was absurd, from its utter lack of any response from his wife.  It was like tilting with a windmill.

Ida continued to sway gently back and forth, and smile.