f by this evasion, as the robin
reveals her nest by flitting from it.

Yet there were times when he really tried to force himself into a
revival of this calmer emotion. He studied Hope's beauty with his eyes,
he pondered on all her nobleness. He wished to bring his whole heart
back to her--or at least wished that he wished it. But hearts that have
educated themselves into faithlessness must sooner or later share the
suffering they give. Love will be avenged on them. Nothing could
have now recalled this epicure in passion, except, possibly, a little
withholding or semi-coquetry on Hope's part, and this was utterly
impossible for her. Absolute directness was a part of her nature; she
could die, but not manouvre.

It actually diminished Hope's hold on Philip, that she had at this
time the whole field to herself. Emilia had gone for a few weeks to the
mountains, with the household of which she was a guest. An ideal and
unreasonable passion is strongest in absence, when the dream is all pure
dream, and safe from the discrepancies of daily life. When the two girls
were together, Emilia often showed herself so plainly Hope's inferior,
that it jarred on Philip's fine perceptions. But in Emilia's absence the
spell of temperament, or whatever else brought them together, resumed
its sway unchecked; she became one great magnet of attraction, and all
the currents of the universe appeared to flow from the direction where
her eyes were shining. When she was out of sight, he needed to make no
allowance for her defects, to reproach himself with no overt acts of
disloyalty to Hope, to recognize no criticisms of his own intellect or
conscience. He could resign himself to his reveries, and pursue them
into new subtleties day by day.

There was Mrs. Meredith's house, too, where they had been so happy. And
now the blinds were pitilessly closed, all but one where the Venetian
slats had slipped, and stood half open as if some dainty fingers held
them, and some lovely eyes looked through. He gazed so long and so often
on that silent house,--by day, when the scorching sunshine searched its
pores as if to purge away every haunting association, or by night, when
the mantle of darkness hung tenderly above it, and seemed to collect the
dear remembrances again,--that his fancy by degrees grew morbid, and
its pictures unreal. "It is impossible," he one day thought to himself,
"that she should have lived in that room so long, sat in that window,
dre