intance, such a dislike to him that it
would be odious to her to see him again within her doors; and he would
have felt indelicate in taking warrant from her original invitation
(before she had seen him) to inflict on her a presence which he had no
reason to suppose the lapse of time had made less offensive. She had
given him no sign of pardon or penitence in any of the little ways that
are familiar to women--by sending him a message through her sister, or
even a book, a photograph, a Christmas card, or a newspaper, by the
post. He felt, in a word, not at liberty to ring at her door; he didn't
know what kind of a fit the sight of his long Mississippian person would
give her, and it was characteristic of him that he should wish so to
spare the sensibilities of a young lady whom he had not found tender;
being ever as willing to let women off easily in the particular case as
he was fixed in the belief that the sex in general requires watching.

Nevertheless, he found himself, at the end of half an hour, standing on
the only spot in Charles Street which had any significance for him. It
had occurred to him that if he couldn't call upon Verena without calling
upon Olive, he should be exempt from that condition if he called upon
Mrs. Tarrant. It was not her mother, truly, who had asked him, it was
the girl herself; and he was conscious, as a candid young American, that
a mother is always less accessible, more guarded by social prejudice,
than a daughter. But he was at a pass in which it was permissible to
strain a point, and he took his way in the direction in which he knew
that Cambridge lay, remembering that Miss Tarrant's invitation had
reference to that quarter and that Mrs. Luna had given him further
evidence. Had she not said that Verena often went back there for visits
of several days--that her mother had been ill and she gave her much
care? There was nothing inconceivable in her being engaged at that hour
(it was getting to be one o'clock) in one of those expeditions--nothing
impossible in the chance that he might find her in Cambridge. The
chance, at any rate, was worth taking; Cambridge, moreover, was worth
seeing, and it was as good a way as another of keeping his holiday. It
occurred to him, indeed, that Cambridge was a big place, and that he had
no particular address. This reflexion overtook him just as he reached
Olive's house, which, oddly enough, he was obliged to pass on his way to
the mysterious suburb. That i