Captain
Beauchamp, madam.'

'I too; but he will write, and I really can wait no longer,' Rosamund
replied, in extreme apprehension lest a certain degree of pressure
should overbear her repugnance to the doctor's dinner-table. Miss
Denham's look was fixed on her; but, whatever it might mean, Rosamund's
endurance was at an end. She was invited to dine; she refused. She was
exceedingly glad to find herself on the high-road again, with a prospect
of reaching Steynham that night; for it was important that she should
not have to confess a visit to Bevisham now when she had so little of
favourable to tell Mr. Everard Romfrey of his chosen nephew. Whether she
had acted quite wisely in not remaining to see Nevil, was an agitating
question that had to be silenced by an appeal to her instincts of
repulsion, and a further appeal for justification of them to her
imaginary sisterhood of gossips. How could she sit and eat, how pass an
evening in that house, in the society of that man? Her tuneful chorus
cried, 'How indeed.' Besides, it would have offended Mr. Romfrey to
hear that she had done so. Still she could not refuse to remember Miss
Denham's marked intimations of there being a reason for Nevil's friend
to seize the chance of an immediate interview with him; and in her
distress at the thought, Rosamund reluctantly, but as if compelled
by necessity, ascribed the young lady's conduct to a strong sense of
personal interests.

'Evidently she has no desire he should run the risk of angering a rich
uncle.'

This shameful suspicion was unavoidable: there was no other opiate
for Rosamund's blame of herself after letting her instincts gain the
ascendancy.

It will be found a common case, that when we have yielded to our
instincts, and then have to soothe conscience, we must slaughter
somebody, for a sacrificial offering to our sense of comfort.

CHAPTER XIII. A SUPERFINE CONSCIENCE

However much Mr. Everard Romfrey may have laughed at Nevil Beauchamp
with his 'banana-wreath,' he liked the fellow for having volunteered for
that African coast-service, and the news of his promotion by his admiral
to the post of commander through a death vacancy, had given him an
exalted satisfaction, for as he could always point to the cause of
failures, he strongly appreciated success. The circumstance had offered
an occasion for the new commander to hit him hard upon a matter of fact.
Beauchamp had sent word of his advance in rank, but requ