CHAPTER XIV.



THE ZOUAVE OFFICER.

Whatever trouble Ethel had experienced at Naples from her conviction
that Hawbury was false was increased and, if possible, intensified by
the discovery that he had followed them to Rome. His true motives for
this could not possibly be known to her, so she, of course, concluded
that it was his infatuation for Minnie, and his determination to win
her for himself. She felt confident that he knew that she belonged to
the party, but was so utterly indifferent to her that he completely
ignored her, and had not sufficient interest in her to ask the
commonest question about her. All this, of course, only confirmed her
previous opinion, and it also deepened her melancholy. One additional
effect it also had, and that was to deprive her of any pleasure that
might be had from drives about Rome. She felt a morbid dread of
meeting him somewhere; she did not yet feel able to encounter him; she
could not trust herself; she felt sure that if she saw him she would
lose all self-control, and make an exhibition of humiliating weakness.
The dread of this was sufficient to detain her at home; and so she
remained indoors, a prisoner, refusing her liberty, brooding over her
troubles, and striving to acquire that indifference to him which she
believed he had toward her. Now going about was the very thing which
would have alleviated her woes, but this was the very thing that she
was unwilling to do; nor could any persuasion shake her resolve.