"It is a life worth living."
"So different from most people's lives!" and the deep blue eyes, which for a moment had kindled as of old, went forlornly to some far distance, with a listless sadness which struck home to Jem like a keen stab. Then they came back to him, kind and anxious again. "But you do look too much overdone. You must remember your friends."
"My love, we have not much time to spare," the General said. "I suppose we can hardly ask Mr. Trevelyan to come again with us to the bridge."
"He said he was tired," put in Jean.
"I am sure he is. Oh no; we shall meet by-and-by. He ought to go back now," Evelyn said at once, and they parted.
Jem made no effort to decide the matter for himself.
Few words were spoken on the way home. Jean gave a questioning glance now and then, of which Jem seemed unconscious. He was absorbed in his own thoughts. They did the remaining distance at a good brisk pace, never slackening speed. But when the house was reached, Jem all at once succumbed, seeming to be utterly wearied out. Jean had never known him so before, and she saw with a sense of dismay. To be scolded by Madame Collier for not taking better care of her cousin was a new experience, in a house where nobody ever thought about health; but Jem's exhaustion was something new also.
He had found his way to the drawing-room sofa, and there it seemed most merciful to leave him undisturbed. None in the house could guess at the real cause of his prostration—could know how the haunting vision of those sad violet eyes never left him for a moment. Jem saw them continually, whether his own aching eyes were open or shut.
"I'm sure I don't know what's to be done. He doesn't seem fit to go," said Madame Collier, when six o'clock came.
Jean would hardly have been more startled by the fall of a stack of chimneys than by the implied doubt. Not go to dinner at the Park! Memory failed to supply any precedent in the shape of a broken engagement. If a Trevelyan undertook to do something, he did it at all costs and hazards, short of absolute impossibility.