Had Rose been guiltless of offence, Evan might have left Beckley Court the next day, to cherish his outraged self-love.  Love of woman is strongly distinguished from pure egoism when it has got a wound:  for it will not go into a corner complaining, it will fight its duel on the field or die.  Did the young lady know his origin, and scorn him?  He resolved to stay and teach her that the presumption she had imputed to him was her own mistake.  And from this Evan graduated naturally enough the finer stages of self-deception downward.

A lover must have his delusions, just as a man must have a skin.  But here was another singular change in Evan.  After his ale-prompted speech in Fallow field, he was nerved to face the truth in the eyes of all save Rose.  Now that the truth had enmeshed his beloved, he turned to battle with it; he was prepared to deny it at any moment; his burnt flesh was as sensitive as the Countess’s.

Let Rose accuse him, and he would say, ’This is true, Miss Jocelyn—­what then?’ and behold Rose confused and dumb!  Let not another dare suspect it.  For the fire that had scorched him was in some sort healing, though horribly painful; but contact with the general air was not to be endured —­was death!  This, I believe, is common in cases of injury by fire.  So it befell that Evan, meeting Rose the next morning was playfully asked by her what choice he had made between the white and the red; and he, dropping on her the shallow eyes of a conventional smile, replied, that unable to decide and form a choice, he had thrown both away; at which Miss Jocelyn gave him a look in the centre of his brows, let her head slightly droop, and walked off.

‘She can look serious as well as grimace,’ was all that Evan allowed himself to think, and he strolled out on the lawn with the careless serenity of lovers when they fancy themselves heart-free.

Rose, whipping the piano in the drawing-room, could see him go to sit by Mrs. Evremonde, till they were joined by Drummond, when he left her and walked with Harry, and apparently shadowed the young gentleman’s unreflective face; after which Harry was drawn away by the appearance of that dark star, the Countess de Saldar, whom Rose was beginning to detest.  Jenny glided by William Harvey’s side, far off.  Rose, the young Queen of Friendship, was left deserted on her music-stool for a throne, and when she ceased to hammer the notes she was insulted by a voice that cried from below: 

‘Go on, Rose, it’s nice in the sun to hear you,’ causing her to close her performances and the instrument vigorously.

Rose was much behind her age:  she could not tell what was the matter with her.  In these little torments young people have to pass through they gain a rapid maturity.  Let a girl talk with her own heart an hour, and she is almost a woman.  Rose came down-stairs dressed for riding.  Laxley was doing her the service of smoking one of her rose-trees.  Evan stood disengaged, prepared for her summons.  She did not notice him, but beckoned to Laxley drooping over a bud, while the curled smoke floated from his lips.