Colville went out into the sunlight feeling like some strange, newly invented kind of scoundrel--a rascal of such recent origin and introduction that he had not yet had time to classify himself and ascertain the exact degree of his turpitude. The task employed his thoughts all that day, and kept him vibrating between an instinctive conviction of monstrous wickedness and a logical and well-reasoned perception that he had all the facts and materials for a perfectly good conscience. He was the betrothed lover of this poor child, whose affection he could not check without a degree of brutality for which only a better man would have the courage. When he thought of perhaps refusing her caresses, he imagined the shock it would give her, and the look of grief and mystification that would come into her eyes, and he found himself incapable of that cruel rectitude. He knew that these were the impulses of a white and loving soul; but at the end of all his argument they remained a terror to him, so that he lacked nothing but the will to fly from Florence and shun her altogether till she had heard from her family. This, he recalled, with bitter self-reproach was what had been his first inspiration; he had spoken of it to Mrs. Bowen, and it had still everything in its favour except that it was impossible. Imogene returned to the salotto, where the little girl was standing with her face to the window, drearily looking out; her back expressed an inner desolation which revealed itself in her eyes when Imogene caught her head between her hands, and tilted up her face to kiss it. "What is the matter, Effie?" she demanded gaily. "Nothing." "Oh yes, there is." "Nothing that you will care for. As long as he's pleasant to you, you don't care what he does to me." "What has he done to you?" "He didn't take the slightest notice of me when I came into the room. He didn't speak to me, or even look at me." Imogene caught the little grieving, quivering face to her breast "He is a wicked, wicked wretch! And I will give him the awfulest scolding he ever had when he comes here again. I will teach him to neglect my pet. I will let him understand that if he doesn't notice you, he needn't notice me. I will tell you, Effie--I've just thought of a way. The next time he comes we will both receive him. We will sit up very stiffly on the sofa together, and just answer Yes, No, Yes, No, to everything he says, till he begins to take the hint, and learns how to behave himself. Will you?" A smile glittered through the little girl's tears; but she asked, "Do you think it would be very polite?" "No matter, polite or not, it's what he deserves. Of course, as soon as he begins to take the hint, we will be just as we always are."