Nor did the presence of the Volkonskys in Washington conduce to Olivia’s enjoyment although it certainly did to her father’s. The Colonel was delighted. In the course of years, Eliza Peyton had afforded him great amusement. He was a chivalrous man to women, although not above teasing Madame Volkonsky, but he refrained from doing what poor Elise very much dreaded he would--telling of her American origin. She had admitted that her mother was an American--an admission necessary to account for the native, idiomatic way in which she spoke the English language, and Colonel Berkeley knowing this, did not hesitate to say that in years gone by, he had known Madame Volkonsky’s mother, and very cheerfully bore testimony to the fact that the mother had been of good family and gentle breeding. So instead of being a disadvantage to her, it was rather a help. But Olivia and herself were so distinctly antipathetic that it could scarcely fail to produce antagonism. And besides her whole course about Pembroke had shocked Olivia. Olivia was amazed--it was not the mere difference of conduct and opinion--it was the difference of temperament. Remembering that Madame Volkonsky had at least the inheritance of refinement, and was quite at home in the usages of gentle breeding, it seemed the more inexcusable. In all those years Olivia had been unable to define her feelings to Pembroke. She could easily have persuaded herself that she was quite indifferent to him except that she could not forget him. It annoyed her. It was like a small, secret pain, a trifling malady, of which the sufferer is ashamed to speak. Not so Pembroke. The love that survives such a blow to pride and vanity as a refusal, is love indeed--and after the first tempest of mortification he had realized that his passion would not die, but needed to be killed--and after five years of partial absence, awkward estrangement, all those things which do most effectually kill everything which is not love, her presence was yet sweet and potent. The discovery afforded him a certain grim amusement. He was getting well on in his thirties. His hair was turning prematurely gray, and he felt that youth was behind him--a not altogether unpleasant feeling to an ambitious man. Nevertheless, they went on dining together at the Berkeleys’ own house, at the De Peysters’, at other places, meeting constantly at the same houses--for Pembroke went out more than he had ever done in Washington before, drawn subtly by the chance of meeting Olivia--although where once she was cool and friendly, she was now a little warmer in her manner, yet not wholly free from embarrassment. But neither was unhappy. CHAPTER XVII.