Should the worst come to the worst, the Ropers could not absolutely destroy him.

That they could bring an action against him, and have him locked up for a term of years, and dismissed from his office, and exposed in all the newspapers, he seemed to know.

That might all, however, be endured, if only the gauntlet could be thrown down for him by some one else.
The one thing which he felt that he could not do was, to write to a girl whom he had professed to love, and tell her that he did not love her.

He knew that he could not himself form such words upon the paper; nor, as he was well aware, could he himself find the courage to tell her to her face that he had changed his mind.

He knew that he must become the victim of his Amelia, unless he could find some friendly knight to do battle in his favour; and then again he thought of his mother.
But when he returned home he was as far as ever from any resolve to tell her how he was situated.