She looked in spite of herself--she must
needs look at him,--and it was evident that as yet the cheesemonger's
daughter had found no way to cheer him. Thistlewood never altered. Those
strong self-contained natures have a power upon themselves as they
have on other people. He could last for years in solid and complete
devotion--he could apparently wait for ever--and could yet hide from the
eyes of the outer world the steady fires which burned within him.
That butterfly nature of poor Lane's forced Thistlewood's virtues into
prominence by contrast, and the girl had them almost constantly in her
thoughts. There was nothing--she told herself remorsefully--that this
typical piece of solidity and devotion would not do for her. Her faith
in his attachment transcended bounds, and she felt it to be a thousand
pities that she could not love him.

It does not happen in every life-history that this sort of profound
feeling finds an opportunity of proof, but in the story of the lives of
John Thistlewood and Lane Protheroe this thing came to pass in such wise
that he who ran might read the natures of the men, and know them once
for all.

Bulldog John had gone on doggedly courting, and butterfly Lane had taken
to seeing too much convivial company in Heydon Hey and Castle Barfield,
and there was a fear in Bertha's mind that if her influence had not been
permanent, it had at least started the young man on a track likely to
prove disastrous. These emotional people, quick to feel and quick to
forget, are hardly to be dealt with without danger.

Lane's dissipations must have been graver than even rumour gave them
discredit for being. His midnight junketings had made a ghost of him,
and to see him at any moment when he thought himself unobserved was
to wonder how long such a mournful and broken young gentleman could
possibly rouse himself to fill the part of King even in a rustic
Bohemia.

Autumn was on the land. The corn-shocks were standing in the stubbled
fields, and the night air was full of gossamer, which twined itself
about the faces of all wayfarers. Rural work had gone on merrily all
day, and when the sun set silence fell, and darkness like a warm shroud.
Lights flickered a while in the village and the farmhouse, and then went
out one by one. The moon stole over the Beacon Hill, and looked mildly
across the valley.

There was not a breath of air stirring, and not a sound upon the night
except for the placid and continual gurg