ut Mr. Trevelyan.

Nor did "the Colonel" find an opportunity of expressing a spark of
that sentiment, for the purpose of expressing which he had made
this journey to Devonshire. It is not pleasant to make love in the
presence of a third person, even when that love is all fair and above
board; but it is quite impracticable to do so to a married lady, when
that married lady's sister is present. No more futile visit than
this of Colonel Osborne's to the Clock House was ever made. And yet,
though not a word was spoken to which Mr. Trevelyan himself could
have taken the slightest exception, the visit, futile as it was,
could not but do an enormous deal of harm. Mrs. Crocket had already
guessed that the fine gentleman down from London was the lover of the
married lady at the Clock House, who was separated from her husband.
The wooden-legged postman and the ostler were not long in connecting
the man among the tombstones with the visitor to the house.
Trevelyan, as we are aware, already knew that Colonel Osborne was in
the neighbourhood. And poor Priscilla Stanbury was now exposed to the
terrible necessity of owning the truth to her aunt. "The Colonel,"
when he had sat an hour with his young friends, took his leave; and,
as he walked back to Mrs. Crocket's, and ordered that his fly might
be got ready for him, his mind was heavy with the disagreeable
feeling that he had made an ass of himself. The whole affair had
been a failure; and though he might be able to pass off the porch at
Cockchaffington among his friends, he could not but be aware himself
that he had spent his time, his trouble, and his money for nothing.
He became aware, as he returned to Lessboro', that had he intended to
make any pleasant use whatever of his position in reference to Mrs.
Trevelyan, the tone of his letter and his whole mode of proceeding
should have been less patriarchal. And he should have contrived a
meeting without the presence of Nora Rowley.

As soon as he had left them, Mrs. Trevelyan went to her own room, and
Nora at once rejoined Priscilla.

"Is he gone?" asked Priscilla.

"Oh, yes;--he has gone."

"What would I have given that he had never come!"

"And yet," said Nora, "what harm has he done? I wish he had not come,
because, of course, people will talk! But nothing was more natural
than that he should come over to see us when he was so near us."

"Nora!"

"What do you mean?"

"You don't believe all that? In the neighbourhood! I