'What, and go away--already! Surely that is too much to expect,' I ventured, looking down into her eyes, which, if not boasting any poetical attractions of 'hidden depths,' were very clear and straightforward. 'Oh no, I don't mean that; but you could come and stay nearer to us. The people at Lossie Villa are just going to leave, I know.' 'I am bound here for a little while, as one of my oldest friends has just asked me to give shelter to his wife and her mother for a few weeks.' 'Indeed! Oh, they will be some people to know. Have I ever heard of them?' 'I don't know. The mother's name is Mrs. Ellmer, the daughter's--Mrs. Scott. She has been ill, I believe.' 'Mrs. Ellmer! Why, surely those are the people who used to live at the cottage! Oh, I have heard about them and your kindness to them. People said----' She hesitated. 'Well, what did they say?' 'Oh, well, they said you used to be very fond of--the daughter.' 'So I was; so I am. But you need not be jealous.' She laughed, a bright clear laugh, scarcely without a touch of good-humoured contempt at the suggestion. 'I jealous! Oh, Mr. Maude, you would not seriously accuse me of such a paltry feeling! It would be unworthy of you, unworthy of me.' I felt, when I had taken my _fiancée_ home and formally received her parents' sanction to our engagement, that I was myself unworthy to live in the intellectual and moral heights on which she flourished. But I could creep after her in a humble fashion, and do my best to make her love me. And in the meantime my loyalty to my friend and my friend's wife was strengthened by a new and sacred bond. CHAPTER XXI I suppose no man ever tried harder to be deeply, earnestly, sincerely in love than I tried to be with Miss Farington; and I suppose no man ever failed more completely. I believe now that to any other woman I have ever met, being a man by no means without affectionate impulses, and being also in a most propitious mood for sentiment, I should have been by the end of the week a submissive if not adoring slave. I wanted to be a slave; I was even anxious to become, for the time at least, the mere chattel of somebody else, a gracious and kindly somebody, be it well understood, who would give me the wages of affection in return for my best efforts in her service.