e were rencounters
accidental and contrived, stealthy correspondence, sudden misgivings on
one side, sudden self-reproaches on the other. The inner state of the
twain was one as of confused noise that would not allow the accents of
calmer reason to be heard. Determinations to go in this direction, and
headlong plunges in that; dignified safeguards, undignified collapses;
not a single rash step by deliberate intention, and all against
judgment.

It was all that Melbury had expected and feared. It was more, for he
had overlooked the publicity that would be likely to result, as it now
had done. What should he do--appeal to Mrs. Charmond himself, since
Grace would not? He bethought himself of Winterborne, and resolved to
consult him, feeling the strong need of some friend of his own sex to
whom he might unburden his mind.

He had entirely lost faith in his own judgment. That judgment on which
he had relied for so many years seemed recently, like a false companion
unmasked, to have disclosed unexpected depths of hypocrisy and
speciousness where all had seemed solidity. He felt almost afraid to
form a conjecture on the weather, or the time, or the fruit-promise, so
great was his self-abasement.

It was a rimy evening when he set out to look for Giles. The woods
seemed to be in a cold sweat; beads of perspiration hung from every
bare twig; the sky had no color, and the trees rose before him as
haggard, gray phantoms, whose days of substantiality were passed.
Melbury seldom saw Winterborne now, but he believed him to be occupying
a lonely hut just beyond the boundary of Mrs. Charmond's estate, though
still within the circuit of the woodland. The timber-merchant's thin
legs stalked on through the pale, damp scenery, his eyes on the dead
leaves of last year; while every now and then a hasty "Ay?" escaped his
lips in reply to some bitter proposition.

His notice was attracted by a thin blue haze of smoke, behind which
arose sounds of voices and chopping: bending his steps that way, he saw
Winterborne just in front of him. It just now happened that Giles,
after being for a long time apathetic and unemployed, had become one of
the busiest men in the neighborhood. It is often thus; fallen friends,
lost sight of, we expect to find starving; we discover them going on
fairly well. Without any solicitation, or desire for profit on his
part, he had been asked to execute during that winter a very large
order for hurdles and