The fierce combat between his good and evil spirits waged for an instant, he must either fall before this commanding angel, or crush with a mighty blow, and forever, the already weak agent of good, whose "wee small voice" tantalized him strangely at this moment. But while he hesitated, his destiny decided itself; a new phase suddenly substituted his calculating indifference, he felt a strong, jealous passion flooding his whole soul, he saw the beauty of Honor Edgeworth's face by an entirely new light, he scorned the suspicion--but the truth was terribly bare, he had been caught in his own meshes--he loved this girl. It did not steal upon him, nor come by slow degrees, but rushed in a crushing torrent of realization, into his heart. All the words of devotedness and admiration, that he had spoken to her of late, were only a mockery, to what his passion suggested now. Love, to so many others an enviable blessing, threatened to be a miserable portion for him, for naturally enough, coming to him as it did through the channels of the soul, it had to partake of the unholy nature of these unhealthy and corrupt by-ways; and hence instead of the pure, buoyant emotion that fills the honest breast, in the redeeming passion of its first exalted love, there rushed into the heart of Vivian Standish, a poisonous torrent of insuperable desire, that held him like an iron-bound victim, foaming and struggling in his own chains. A look of devouring admiration flashed from his fiery eyes over the face of the girl. She was thinking; thinking something pleasant, something fascinating, thinking of someone agreeable to her thought--who was not _he_, this he knew, and a crushing feeling of envy, worse than the worst hatred, filled him. Whose memory did he, by his own voluntary action, awake within her by bringing her to this spot? who was it, conjured by her, sat between them, or perhaps substituted him altogether? "Egad," he stifled, between his teeth, "I must know the worst of this." With a voice that bespoke a terrible power of self-command, Vivian, blandly broke this heavy silence-- "I need not ask if you enjoy yourself, Honor, I can see that?" The girl turned her head slowly towards him, as if loth to raise her eyes from the visionary world, that fascinated her, and smiling, as if in sad remembrance, answered abstractedly, "Yes, I am easily influenced by such surroundings as these," and as she spoke she waved her hand with a graceful gesture that took in her picturesque environs. "That _movement_, included me, I wonder if the _words_ did as well," he said quickly, and so huskily, that Honor looked up a little startled. "Well--yes, you too," she said laughingly, though a little stiffly, "you must suppose that you have your share of influence over me as well as every other thing and person associated with my life."