Roland appealed to her. “You! my sister! it is you that consent to this wild freak, enough to break your father’s heart?” He had really forgotten his knowledge of her character—what much he knew—in the dust of the desperation flung about her by Nevil Beauchamp. She shook her head; she had not consented. “The man she loves is her voice and her will,” said Beauchamp. “She gives me her hand and I lead her.” Roland questioned her. It could not be denied that she had given her hand, and her bewildered senses made her think that it had been with an entire abandonment; and in the heat of her conflict of feelings, the deliciousness of yielding to him curled round and enclosed her, as in a cool humming sea-shell. “Renée!” said Roland. “Brother!” she cried. “You see that I cannot suffer you to be borne away.” “No; do not!” But the boat was flying fast from Venice, and she could have fallen at his feet and kissed them for not countermanding it. “You are in my charge, my sister.” “Yes.” “And now, Nevil, between us two,” said Roland. Beauchamp required no challenge. He seemed, to Rosamund Culling, twice older than he was, strangely adept, yet more strangely wise of worldly matters, and eloquent too. But it was the eloquence of frenzy, madness, in Roland’s ear. The arrogation of a terrible foresight that harped on present and future to persuade him of the righteousness of this headlong proceeding advocated by his friend, vexed his natural equanimity. The argument was out of the domain of logic. He could hardly sit to listen, and tore at his moustache at each end. Nevertheless his sister listened. The mad Englishman accomplished the miracle of making her listen, and appear to consent. Roland laughed scornfully. “Why Trieste? I ask you, why Trieste? You can’t have a Catholic priest at your bidding, without her father’s sanction.” “We leave Renée at Trieste, under the care of madame,” said Beauchamp, “and we return to Venice, and I go to your father. This method protects Renée from annoyance.” “It strikes me that if she arrives at any determination she must take the consequences.” “She does. She is brave enough for that. But she is a girl; she has to fight the battle of her life in a day, and I am her lover, and she leaves it to me.” “Is my sister such a coward?” said Roland. Renée could only call out his name. “It will never do, my dear Nevil”; Roland tried to deal with his unreasonable friend affectionately. “I am responsible for her. It’s your own fault—if you had not saved my life I should not have been in your way. Here I am, and your proposal can’t be heard of. Do as you will, both of you, when you step ashore in Venice.” “If she goes back she is lost,” said Beauchamp, and he attacked Roland on the side of his love for Renée, and for him.