Too many men had told her that she was essential to their happiness to permit qualms on this score.

Her conscience did shrink, to some extent, from a loveless, business-like marriage, and her preference for Graydon made such a union all the more repugnant; but she was incapable of feeling that she would do him a wrong by giving him the pretty jewelled hand for which so many had asked.

Indeed, the question now was, Could she be so self-sacrificing as to think of it under the circumstances?
If that stock would only rise, if in some way she could be assured that the Muirs would be sustained, and so pass on to the wealth sure to flow in upon them in prosperous times, she would decide the question at once, whether they would do anything for her father or not.

He could scramble on in some way, as he had done in the past.

What she desired most was the assurance that there should be no long and doubtful interregnum of poverty and privation--that she might continue to be a queen in society during the period of youth and beauty.
This remained the chief consideration amid the chaos of her conflicting feelings and interests, for she had lived this life so long that she could imagine no other as endurable.