“Hark to me, Eliza.  Give up Hamlyn—­I have said I don’t like the man; give up Tom Rivers also, an’ you will.  Remain at home with me until a better suitor shall present himself, and Leet Hall and its broad lands shall be yours.”

She looked up in surprise.  Leet Hall had always hitherto gone in the male line; and, failing Hubert, it would be, or ought to be, Harry Carradyne’s.  Though she knew not that any steps had already been taken in that direction.

“Leet Hall?” she exclaimed.

“Leet Hall and its broad lands,” repeated the Captain impatiently.  “Give up Mr. Hamlyn and it shall all be yours.”

She remained for some moments in deep thought, her head bent, revolving the offer.  She was fond of pomp and power, as her father had ever been, and the temptation to rule as sole domineering mistress in her girlhood’s home was great.  But at that very instant the tall fine form of Philip Hamlyn passed across a pathway in the distance, and she turned from the temptation for ever.  What little capability of loving had been left to her after the advent of Robert Grame was given to Mr. Hamlyn.

“I cannot give him up,” she said in low tones.

“What moonshine, Eliza!  You are not a love-sick girl now.”

The colour dyed her face painfully.  Did her father suspect aught of the past; of where her love had been given—­and rejected?  The suspicion only added fuel to the fire.

“I cannot give up Mr. Hamlyn,” she reiterated.

“Then you will never inherit Leet Hall.  No, nor aught else of mine.”

“As you please, sir, about that.”

“You set me at defiance, then!”

“I don’t wish to do so, father; but I shall marry Mr. Hamlyn.”

“At defiance,” repeated the Captain, as she moved to escape from his presence; “Katherine secretly, you openly.  Better that I had never had children.  Look here, Eliza:  let this matter remain in abeyance for six or twelve months, things resting as they are.  By that time you may have come to your senses; or I (yes, I see you are ready to retort it) to mine.  If not—­well, we shall only then be where we are.”

“And that we should be,” returned Eliza, doggedly.  “Time will never change either of us.”

“But events may.  Let it be so, child.  Stay where you are for the present, in your maiden home.”

She shook her head in denial; not a line of her proud face giving way, nor a curve of her decisive lips:  and Captain Monk knew that he had pleaded in vain.  She would neither give up her marriage nor prolong the period of its celebration.

What could be the secret of her obstinacy?  Chiefly the impossibility of tolerating opposition to her own indomitable will.  It was her father’s will over again; his might be a very little softening with years and trouble; not much.  Had she been in desperate love with Hamlyn one could have understood it, but she was not; at most it was but a passing fancy.  What says the poet?  I daresay you all know the lines, and I know I have quoted them times and again, they are so true: