Rhoda had not surrendered the stern belief that she had done well by forcing Dahlia’s hand to the marriage, though it had resulted evilly.  In reflecting on it, she had still a feeling of the harsh joy peculiar to those who have exercised command with a conscious righteousness upon wilful, sinful, and erring spirits, and have thwarted the wrongdoer.  She could only admit that there was sadness in the issue; hitherto, at least, nothing worse than sad disappointment.  The man who was her sister’s husband could no longer complain that he had been the victim of an imposition.  She had bought his promise that he would leave the country, and she had rescued the honour of the family by paying him.  At what cost?  She asked herself that now, and then her self-support became uneven.  Could her uncle have parted with the great sum—­have shed it upon her, merely beneficently, and because he loved her?  Was it possible that he had the habit of carrying his own riches through the streets of London?  She had to silence all questions imperiously, recalling exactly her ideas of him, and the value of money in the moment when money was an object of hunger—­when she had seized it like a wolf, and its value was quite unknown, unguessed at.

Rhoda threw up her window before she slept, that she might breathe the cool night air; and, as she leaned out, she heard steps moving away, and knew them to be Robert’s, in whom that pressure of her hand had cruelly resuscitated his longing for her.  She drew back, wondering at the idleness of men—­slaves while they want a woman’s love, savages when they have won it.  She tried to pity him, but she had not an emotion to spare, save perhaps one of dull exultation, that she, alone of women, was free from that wretched mess called love; and upon it she slept.

It was between the breakfast and dinner hours, at the farm, next day, when the young squire, accompanied by Anthony Hackbut, met farmer Fleming in the lane bordering one of the outermost fields of wheat.  Anthony gave little more than a blunt nod to his relative, and slouched on, leaving the farmer in amazement, while the young squire stopped him to speak with him.  Anthony made his way on to the house.  Shortly after, he was seen passing through the gates of the garden, accompanied by Rhoda.  At the dinner-hour, Robert was taken aside by the farmer.  Neither Rhoda nor Anthony presented themselves.  They did not appear till nightfall.  When Anthony came into the room, he took no greetings and gave none.  He sat down on the first chair by the door, shaking his head, with vacant eyes.  Rhoda took off her bonnet, and sat as strangely silent.  In vain Mrs. Sumfit asked her; “Shall it be tea, dear, and a little cold meat?” The two dumb figures were separately interrogated, but they had no answer.

“Come! brother Tony?” the farmer tried to rally him.

Dahlia was knitting some article of feminine gear.  Robert stood by the musk-pots at the window, looking at Rhoda fixedly.  Of this gaze she became conscious, and glanced from him to the clock.