She would never upbraid Evan with his baseness, never more would she go there; she would simply tear his image out of her heart, and let the matter end. But this was easier to say than to achieve. Her soul seemed to have become numbed within her--frozen, if we may use such terms. Even in the matter of Sir Paget, she was conscious now of feeling neither repugnance nor ridicule, though she felt a little repentance at her opposition to the wishes of her father and mother, and for the duplicity of which she had been guilty towards them in her love for an unworthy object, and meeting him in secret, as if she had been a sewing-girl or waiting-maid, and not the daughter of a peer, and putting herself, perhaps, in an equivocal position. She confided in Olive; otherwise her heart, she thought, would burst. 'The heart is said to be "deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked,"' said Olive, 'but I must confess that this affair passes my comprehension. He cannot be in love with _two_ at once; yet I have read of such things. Forget him; you must do that--at least. You endure too much, Eveline; you believed in him too much, and, I fear, hoped too much. Even friendship has its limits; how much more so love.' 'And but yesterday I was so happy--happy in a love the end of which I could not foresee!' wailed poor Eveline, on her cousin's bosom. What was she like, this Alice? Her rival--oh, disgrace! Fair or dark--she remembered that she was pale and pretty. But what did it matter, thought the now crushed girl, as she tossed feverishly on her pillow in the gloom and solitude of the night, when even our thoughts seem to assume distinct outlines that become sharp and vivid. Night had passed--a new day dawned, and how far, far off seemed yesterday! The sun had risen in his glory; the blackbirds were singing in the dew-laden shrubberies of Maviswood; and the pale mists were clearing off Torduff and Kirkyetton Craig, the highest summits of the lovely Pentlands. It was late ere Eveline had wept herself to sleep; but to her it seemed as if she had not slept at all. Thus it was proportionately late when she awoke heavily to the morning of a new day. She had given her whole soul with joy to her hopeless love for Evan--hopeless, but pure--though any happy end to it she could not foresee; but this was a bitter collapse she did not anticipate, and now her 'occupation was gone.' Was she the same Eveline Graham who but yesterday morning shook off sleep so lightly, and rose fresh, strong, and full of hope, with the conviction that her secret lover was true to her and to this hopeless passion? Her affectionate heart was crushed; her self-esteem was in the dust; her proud head lay low indeed; and for the first time in her young life she had learned what it is to be cut to the soul--to be completely humbled. And Alice--who and what was _she_?