uit signified to her that he must be aware of his
mastery, and she resented it, and stumbled into pitfalls whenever she
opened her lips. It seemed to be denied to them to utter what she meant,
if indeed she had a meaning in speaking, save to hurt herself cruelly
by wounding the man who had caught her in the toils: and so long as she
could imagine that she was the only one hurt, she was the braver and the
harsher for it; but at the sight of Nevil in pain her heart relented and
shifted, and discovering it to be so weak as to be almost at his mercy,
she defended it with an aggressive unkindness, for which, in charity to
her sweeter nature, she had to ask his pardon, and then had to fib to
give reasons for her conduct, and then to pretend to herself that
her pride was humbled by him; a most humiliating round, constantly
recurring; the worse for the reflection that she created it. She
attempted silence. Nevil spoke, and was like the magical piper: she was
compelled to follow him and dance the round again, with the wretched
thought that it must resemble coquettry. Nevil did not think so, but a
very attentive observer now upon the scene, and possessed of his half of
the secret, did, and warned him. Rosamund Culling added that the French
girl might be only an unconscious coquette, for she was young. The
critic would not undertake to pronounce on her suggestion, whether the
candour apparent in merely coquettish instincts was not more dangerous
than a battery of the arts of the sex. She had heard Nevil's frank
confession, and seen Renee twice, when she tried in his service, though
not greatly wishing for success, to stir the sensitive girl for an
answer to his attachment. Probably she went to work transparently, after
the insular fashion of opening a spiritual mystery with the lancet.
Renee suffered herself to be probed here and there, and revealed nothing
of the pain of the operation. She said to Nevil, in Rosamund's hearing:

'Have you the sense of honour acute in your country?' Nevil inquired for
the apropos.

'None,' said she.

Such pointed insolence disposed Rosamund to an irritable antagonism,
without reminding her that she had given some cause for it.

Renee said to her presently: 'He saved my brother's life'; the apropos
being as little perceptible as before.

Her voice dropped to her sweetest deep tones, and there was
a supplicating beam in her eyes, unintelligible to the direct
Englishwoman, except under the headin