Thus Dr. Charles was thrust aside at the moment when he was about to commit himself. Jeanie put him away as if he had been a ploughman, or she a fine lady used to the fine art of easy impertinence. So little thought had she of him at all, that she was not aware of the carelessness with which she had received his semi-declaration, and while he withdrew stung all over as by mental nettles, abashed, insulted, and furious, she went innocently upstairs, without the faintest idea of the offence she had given. And Edgar went into the parlour after his cousin humming an air, with the freshness of the fields about him. The _insouciance_ of the one who had that day given away his living, and the disturbed and nervous trouble of the other, self-conscious to his very finger points, irritated by a constant notion that he was despised and lightly thought of, made the strangest possible contrast between them, notwithstanding a certain family resemblance in their looks. “I am staying to-night,” said Dr. Charles, with a certain abruptness, and that tone of irritated apology which mingled more or less in all he said, “because it is too late for me to get home.” “And I am staying,” said Edgar, “because it is too late to start, I must go to-morrow. I suppose our road lies so far in the same direction.” “You can get the London express at Glasgow, or even Greenock. I am going to Edinburgh.” “I have business in Edinburgh too,” said Edgar. He was so good-humoured, so friendly, that it was very hard to impress upon him the fact that his companion regarded him in no friendly light. “You will leave the loch with very pleasant feelings,” said Dr. Charles, “very different to the rest of us. Fortune has given you the superiority. What I would have done and couldn’t, you have been able to do. It is hard not to grudge a little at such an advantage. The man who has nothing feels himself always so inferior to the man who has something, however small.” “Do you think so?” said Edgar, “my experience would not lead me to that conclusion; and few people can have greater experience. Once I supposed myself to be rather rich. I tumbled down from that all in a moment, and now I have nothing at all; but it seems to me I am the same man as when I was a small potentate in my way, thinking rather better than worse of myself, if truth must be told,” he added with a laugh. “I wish I had your nothing at all,” said Dr. Charles, bitterly; “to us really poor people that is much, which seems little to you.” “Well,” said Edgar, with a shrug of his shoulders, “my poverty is absolute, not comparative now. And you have a profession, while I have none. On the whole, whatever there may be to choose between us, you must have the best of it; for to tell the truth I am in the dismal position of not knowing what to do.” “To do! what does it matter? you have enough to live upon.” “I have nothing to live upon,” said Edgar, with a smile.