THE STARTLING PROPOSAL.

Mr. Hudson and Church met with some cordiality on the surface; but there was distrust, and many an element of discord between the two, which both were glad to suppress, for each feared the other. There was a great deal of talk in low voices, and occasionally a sharp, angry word leaped out of the monotony of sound, as if poisoned arrows were passing to and fro. At last these words knit themselves into sentences, and broke out in force always in expostulation by Hudson, but the threats came bard and keen from Church, as if he were conscious of some power over the other man, which he did not wish to urge in force just then; but was compelled to use sparingly, as a good horseman admonishes a restive horse with the curb and spur.

"I tell you, sir, this is no idle fancy. I love the girl like an idiot, like a fool, if you please, but I love her all the same—and where could you find a better match? I am rich, five times as rich as you know of; stand high among those trusted by men in power; and am not so very old, if you count by feelings—younger than you are, at any rate. What more can you ask for this splendid creature, or can she ask for herself? Love! Why, Hudson, have you known me so long, and doubt that I can make any woman love me, especially a bold, talented, ambitious creature like that. She has a spice of the evil one in her nature, and would pine herself to death with a good man, I tell you. Give her to me! Give her to me, Hudson! I will place her in a position that you never dreamed of for a child of yours!"

"But I fear, I almost know, that she loves this young man!" said Hudson, timidly. "It is a pity, but the attachment was formed long before this idea of yours was thought of. At the time it was a good match for the girl."

"A good match? Why, man, she is the mate of an emperor. Let me but have control of her a year, and she may look down the highest and most beautiful woman in America. Give her to me, and I will make her envied among women, and you rich among men."

"And if I do, always supposing it possible, will that change or break up our past relations?"

"No; my marriage with the girl will consolidate our interests. As for your child, she will have everything the proudest woman in America can desire. I tell you, few men even in this Empire city can match gold with me."

"Then why run more risk?"

"Because I like the excitement, and the greed of gold is strong in me almost as love. Because the father of my wife must be rich, and stand high among men; my ambition demands it—her beauty demands it. After that, poverty shall be an unknown word to her."

Hudson looked up with keen wistfulness, searching the tempter's face with his eyes as a serpent regards his enemy.

"And you seriously mean all this?"

"Seriously. Do you consent?"

"And if I say no?"

"You will not; but even then I should marry her."

"Why ask consent, then, of a man you are so ready to defy?"

"Hudson, I want no quarrels. Personally I like you. As her father, I wish your advancement, which goes hand-in-hand with my own. Without me you can do nothing; against me comes certain ruin. Neither your safety nor your girl's ambition can be accomplished except through me. Is it a bargain then?"

"Have you spoken to Constance?"

"No."

"And you will not till I have talked with her?"

"Of course not. I am no boy to spoil my chances by too much haste. Talk to her as much as you please; but remember this—the girl is mine, or you——"

Hudson threw out both his hands, thus checking the words he dreaded upon those cruel lips.

"I will do my best to act for her good," he said.

"Then the whole affair is settled."

Church took his hat, lighted another cigar, and sauntered down the stairs, humming softly to himself, as a cat purrs when satisfied with the warm hearth it sleeps on.

Hudson sat down in the solitary room, and, holding his head between both hands, fell into a train of dreary thought. However bad this man might have been, he loved his daughter, and shrunk from giving her to a person whom he knew to be cruel and depraved. But even this pure outgush of manly nature was strangled by the thought that one great sin had placed him in the power of this most ruthless being. Had Church asked a greater sacrifice than that of his daughter Constance, in marriage, the unhappy father felt that he would not have dared to resist it.

Hudson made a faint struggle in favor of a hope which had dawned in his heart regarding his daughter and young Sterling, for all the better portion of his nature rose up in revolt against plunging his child into the dark path which he found so full of thorns, so difficult to extricate himself from. But Hudson knew that such thoughts were hopeless now; and felt in all its bitterness, that no chains ever forged from strength and fire, were so strong as those which crime links about a human heart. The day had been when he considered Sterling as a means of salvation for his child.

A gentleman in education and habit, a man of genius, too, he was so far above the girl, and so likely to draw her to his own level, that a really pure ambition had turned the father's hopes that way. But it was all over now. The power of this strong, bad man was upon him and upon her. Turn as he would, there was no way by which the unhappy father could escape from this stern fact. He sat a long time in the room as Church had left him, with both hands locked and falling heavily between the knees on which his elbows rested, his face bowed down, and bitter tears, each drop wrung from struggling memories, filling his eyes as rain breaks through a dusky night. There was no hope in the man's face; no hope in his heart. Even this young girl, his own child, could not be rescued from the miserable destiny that pursued him. In giving her to Church, he was certain that perdition lay at the end of all the brilliant prospects held out to him, for he knew the man.

"Not yet," he said, starting up desperately and pacing the floor to and fro. "He may change his mind; I will not speak yet. Oh, if I had the power to break away from him! My God! my God! help me to save her, for in myself I am helpless."

Hudson took his hat and went out, hurrying down the stairs in haste, as if some task-master were behind him.