"I expect that you will not visit my house until you hear from me again."

Frank's heart sunk within him at these words. He remained looking at Clara's father till he was out of sight, pondering on the important events which had taken place within the last few hours. But as he was not conscious of any wrong, and as he was by disposition and habit straightforward and decisive in his actions, he determined at once to speak on the subject to his father.

He found him still agitated, from his recent interview with Clara's father, and there was an expression of intense anguish on his countenance, for which his son was at a loss to account; for there was nothing that he could understand, in his engagement with Clara, of a nature to produce an effect so powerful of pain and disappointment.

But

It was some time before Frank essayed to speak, as, from love and respect for his father, he was desirous of conveying to him his own determination, which was fixed and unalterable, in the mode least likely to wound his feelings or to incur his displeasure. while he was seeking for fitting words in which to express his resolution, his father suddenly put all attempts at appropriate phraseology to flight, by saying, in a tone, serious and emphatic:"Frank, I guess what you are going to say to me. But I tell you, at once, that it must not be. It would be a cruelty to you to countenance such an engagement. There must be an end, and at once, to this youthful folly. You are both so young, that there is yet time to prevent it from injuring the prospects in life either of yourself or of Miss Lesley. But here it must end!"

199

Frank could not comprehend the meaning of this decisive prohibition, nor what his father meant by its being yet time to prevent any injury to his prospects or to Clara. What prospects had his father in view for him? Was his father thinking of an alliance with one of the daughters of Sir Matthew Carlton? And how would his engagement injure the prospects of Miss Lesley?

Was

there any other-any more wealthy or titled admirer suing for her hand? What did it all mean?

"Will you allow me to ask," said Frank, to his father, "if your objection to my engagement with Miss Lesley is on account of her father's humble circumstances, or his family? Surely you, my dear father, of all others, would not think the less favourably of Miss Lesley's merits, because of her want of for

tune. Is there not enough on my side for us both ?"

Frank had unconsciously touched the burning sore the festering wound which was hurrying his father to the grave. He saw him writhe under his words like a victim at the stake; huge drops of sweat stood on his forehead, and his face was of ashy paleness. He regarded his son with a countenance, in which pride and shame and remorse were blended, in an agonising look, and, in a voice of the bitterest anguish, he exclaimed

"And from my own child, too! Yes-all conspire against me! Friends-wife-child-all! But I tell you that it CANNOT be! There is a secret!-yes-a terrible secret! You must Clara Lesley-it would be ruin to

not marry
you both. It is impossible.

it from your mind for ever.

Go-and dismiss

And now leave

me; I am not strong enough to bear these

scenes.

Leave me, and let me never more

hear a word of this frantic folly!"

Frank was awed by his father's vehement and almost wild denunciation of his passion. Had it been his own happiness only that was at stake, he would have followed the dictates of his affection and his duty to his father, and would at once have ceased from further present importunity; but the happiness of another was involved, and that other the dearest to him on earth. He could not, therefore, retire from his father's presence, feeling an instinctive prescience of the difficulty, if not the impossibility, of renewing the subject, without making an effort to learn the reason of his father's unaccountable determination.

"My dear father," said Frank, "I hope I have ever conducted myself with all respect