De Vaux coloured slightly, and indeed he had not got to the end of his speech ere he had found that he had better have left it unsaid; for, notwithstanding his general fastidiousness, and a certain degree of bitter that mingled with his views of other people, he had too much taste to find any pleasure in pointing out the faults or follies of his near relations. He might feel them a little too sensitively, it is true; but he seldom made them the subject of his conversation; and he was now vexed, both that he had done so at all, and that Marian had been the person to whom he had done it. Thus, Edward de Vaux was a little out of humour with himself, and, as a matter of course, he soon found cause to be dissatisfied with others; for the human mind--to which nothing is so burdensome as self-reproach of any kind--is always glad to cast a part of its load upon the shoulders of other people. The first thing, then, that, upon reflecting rapidly over the moments just passed, Edward de Vaux found to be discontented with, was the manner in which Marian had spoken of delaying their union; and once having started this idea, he hunted it up and down through all the chambers and passages of his mind, like a boy after a mouse. "Their marriage seemed to her a matter of great indifference," he thought; and then he went onto persuade himself that her love for him was of a very calm and tranquil character compared with his for her. Indeed, it seemed little more than indifference, he fancied, or at best _sisterly affection_; and at the very thought of such a thing as _sisterly affection_, the spirit of Edward de Vaux sprang up as if a serpent had crossed his path, although his person remained perfectly calm, with his arm resting on the harpsichord, and his fingers twisting some of the strings of the harp. One of the strings breaking, with a sharp twang, called the spirit suddenly back again; and he found himself standing abstractedly before his fair cousin; while she looked upon him with a smile, which seemed to say, "I could triumph, if I would! but it is not in my nature."