I thought, then, that I had every reason to be grateful to her, and I blamed myself for not loving her spontaneously, as I had loved, as I still fought against loving Rachel. I think now that I had no reason to be grateful to her. If she had not been always by my side, so faithful, so watchful, so never-failing with her worldly lesson, I think I should have found a way out of the darkness of my trouble. I think I should have softened a little when Rachel met me in the gallery, twined her soft arm round my neck, and asked me why we two should be so estranged. I think I should have wept when John took my hand between his two and asked me, in God's name, to tell him why I had grown so altered. But I was blind, deaf, and dumb to their advances. Their reproaches were meaningless, their caresses treacherous, and I would have none of them. I would stand where they themselves had placed me, but I would draw no nearer to set their consciences at rest. And then there was Captain Tyrrell at the Hall. Why did Grace Tyrrell want me to marry her brother? I do not know; unless because she liked me, for she was fond of him; unless because my substantial dowry would be of use to the needy man of fashion. I had heard before that he had made two unsuccessful attempts to marry an heiress. I was not an heiress, but the hand that I should give to a husband would be pretty well filled. At all events he was ever by my side, and Grace (I am now sure) helped him to contrive that it should be so. I did not like him, I never had liked him. Before I had come to Hillsbro' he had wearied me with compliments and attentions. When he had visited me at the farm, elegant as he was, I had contrasted him unfavourably with the absent "ploughman," wondering that language had only provided one word, "man," by which to designate two creatures so different. He was the same now that he had been then; but I, who had soared to things higher, had fallen. Anyone was useful to talk to, to walk with, to drive with, so that time might pass; any noise, any bustle, that would keep me from thinking, was grateful. So I tolerated the attention of Captain Tyrrell, and he and Grace hemmed me in between them. Rachel looked on in silence, sometimes with contempt, sometimes with wondering pity. John kept further and further aloof, and his face got darker, and sadder, and sterner to me. And this it was that bewildered and chafed me more than anything I had suffered yet. Why, since he had turned his back upon me, would he keep constantly looking over his shoulder? And, oh me! how Grace did whisper; and how her whispers fired me with pride, while the confidence I had foolishly given her daily wore away my womanly self-respect.