encircled him. The water curved, and dimpled, and flowed flat, and the
whole body of it rushed into the spaces of sad splendour. The clustered
trees stood like temples of darkness; their shadows lengthened
supernaturally; and a pale gloom crept between them on the sward. He had
been thinking for some time that Rose would knock at his door, and give
him her voice, at least; but she did not come; and when he had gazed out
on the stream till his eyes ached, he felt that he must go and walk by
it. Those little flashes of the hurrying tide spoke to him of a secret
rapture and of a joy-seeking impulse; the pouring onward of all the blood
of life to one illumined heart, mournful from excess of love.

Pardon me, I beg. Enamoured young men have these notions. Ordinarily
Evan had sufficient common sense and was as prosaic as mankind could wish
him; but he has had a terrible fall in the morning, and a young woman
rages in his brain. Better, indeed, and 'more manly,' were he to strike
and raise huge bosses on his forehead, groan, and so have done with it.
We must let him go his own way.

At the door he was met by the Countess. She came into the room without a
word or a kiss, and when she did speak, the total absence of any euphuism
gave token of repressed excitement yet more than her angry eyes and eager
step. Evan had grown accustomed to her moods, and if one moment she was
the halcyon, and another the petrel, it no longer disturbed him, seeing
that he was a stranger to the influences by which she was affected. The
Countess rated him severely for not seeking repose and inviting sympathy.
She told him that the Jocelyns had one and all combined in an infamous
plot to destroy the race of Harrington, and that Caroline had already
succumbed to their assaults; that the Jocelyns would repent it, and
sooner than they thought for; and that the only friend the Harringtons
had in the house was Miss Bonner, whom Providence would liberally reward.