This was a refinement which Legard, though an honourable man as men go,
did not quite understand. "Oh," said he, "that was by some eccentric old
relation,--her father-in-law, I think. Do you think she is bound by such
an engagement?"

Maltravers made no reply, but amused himself by throwing a stick into the
water, and sending one of his dogs after it. Legard looked on, and his
affectionate disposition yearned to make advances which something distant
in the manner of Maltravers chilled and repelled.

When Legard was gone, Maltravers followed him with his eyes. "And this
is the man whom Cleveland thinks Evelyn could love! I could forgive her
marrying Vargrave. Independently of the conscientious feeling that may
belong to the engagement, Vargrave has wit, talent, intellect; and this
man has nothing but the skin of the panther. Was I wrong to save him?
No. Every human life, I suppose, has its uses. But Evelyn--I could
despise her if her heart was the fool of the eye!"

These comments were most unjust to Legard; but they were just of that
kind of injustice which the man of talent often commits against the man
of external advantages, and which the latter still more often retaliates
on the man of talent. As Maltravers thus soliloquized, he was accosted
by Mr. Cleveland.

"Come, Ernest, you must not cut these unfortunate Mertons any longer. If
you continue to do so, do you know what Mrs. Hare and the world will
say?"

"No--what?"