from one another was the bitterest thing
to bear, and as each seemed content to endure it for the good of all, and
as, properly considered, they did not bury their ambition by separating,
they said farewell to the young delicious dawn of it. By means of Fine
Shades it was understood that Brookfield was to be abandoned. Not one
direct word was uttered. There were expressions of regret that the
village children of Ipley would miss the supervizing eyes that had
watched over them--perchance! at any rate, would lose them. All went on
in the household as before, and would have continued so, but that they
had a chief among them. This was Adela Pole, who found her powers with
the occasion.

Adela thought decisively: "People never move unless they are pushed." And
when you have got them to move ever so little, then propel; but by no
means expect that a movement on their part means progression. Without
propulsion nothing results. Adela saw what Cornelia meant to do. It was
not to fly to Sir Twickenham, but to dismiss Mr. Barrett. Arabella
consented to write to Edward Buxley, but would not speak of old days, and
barely alluded to a misunderstanding; though if she loved one man, this
was he. Adela was disengaged. She had moreover to do penance, for a wrong
committed; and just as children will pinch themselves, pleased up to the
verge of unendurable pain, so do sentimentalists find a keen relish in
performing secret penance for self-accused offences. Thus they become
righteous to their own hearts, and evade, as they hope, the public
scourge. The wrong committed was (translated out of Fine Shades), that
she had made love to her sister's lover. In the original tongue--she had
innocently played with the sacred fire of a strange affection; a child in
the temple!--Our penitent child took a keen pinching pleasure in
dictating words for Arabella to employ toward Edward.

And then, recurring to her interview with Wilfrid, it struck her:
"Suppose that, after all, Money!..." Yes, Mammon has acted Hymen before
now. Nothing else explained Mrs. Chump; so she thought, in one clear
glimpse. Inveterate sentimental habit smeared the picture with two
exclamations--"Impossible!" and "Papa!" I desire it to be credited that
these simple interjections absolutely obscured her judgement. Little
people think either what they are made to think, or what they choose to
think; and the education of girls is to make them believe that facts are
their enemies-a n