That Katherine had refused Vance, and straightway married another lover, made very little difference to one of Eve's rigid creed in these matters. To her, love declared was love unchangeable; with air her heart she pitied Vance for his disappointment, and blamed herself for having repeatedly wounded him without reason. By means of this mode of argument, she had naturally succeeded in raising Townsend to the pedestal of a martyred hero, which, it may be conceived by those of colder judgment, did not lessen his importance in the girl's imagination. As the months had gone on, and she had had nothing from him save packages of books and prints sent according to promise, as to a polite entertainer who is thus agreeably disposed of by the beneficiary of hospitality extended, her feelings had taken on the complexion of hopeless regret for an irrevocable past. What Eve had henceforth to do, according to her own strict ordinance, was to live down the impulse that made her give her heart unasked. The stress of these emotions had, in spite of her brave efforts, so worked upon her health that the Colonel, as fond of home as a limpet of his rock, determined to try for her the change of air and experience, resulting as we have seen. And now, on this dazzling day, a "bridal of earth and sky" in one of the loveliest spots upon earth, she kept saying to herself, "By to-morrow--to-morrow, at latest--he will be with me! And then--and then--and _then_--!" The carriage halted at a little wayside booth for the sale of wines and fruit. A dark-skinned woman, bearing a tray of glasses, with flasks of the delusive _Lachrymae Christi_ (made from the grapes ripened upon these slopes) came forward to greet them. On Evelyn's side, a hawker, with shells and strings of coral, and coins alleged to have been found imbedded in the lava near at hand, importuned her. But, rejecting the others, she beckoned to a pretty, bare-legged boy carrying oranges garnished in their own glossy, dark-green leaves; and so busy was she in selecting the best of his refreshing fruit, she hardly observed that another claimant for her attention had appeared close beside the wheel. "Please go away, my good man," she said at last, laughingly, without giving him a glance. "Indeed, I want nothing you can supply." "That is a harsh assertion," Vance said, in a low tone meant for her ear, and then proceeded to greet both his cousins outspokenly. He had reached Naples early that morning; had ascertained at their hotel that they were engaged to start for Vesuvius at a given hour; fearing collision with a party of strangers, had set out alone to walk up the mountain and take his chance of intercepting them; and had waited here for the purpose. "After you had been journeying all night?" said the Colonel, with unfeigned surprise. "Why, my dear fellow, in your place I should have--"