Yet Nell despised Lyttleton heartily, and at times herself scarcely less.
"Nell Lamar, you are becoming an arrant and shameless coquette!" she would exclaim almost fiercely to herself in the privacy of her own room. "I'm ashamed of you! no wonder Dr. Clendenin looks at you as if he despaired of you and pitied you for your depravity. Well, whose fault is it but his; why do his lips refuse to speak what his eyes have said over and over again? Oh, it is mean and shameful! I will not care for him or his reproving looks! He is no better than I, and yet—and yet—O Kenneth, Kenneth, you are good and noble and true, though I cannot understand it!"
Thus she was by turns angry and repentant, now reproaching him, and now herself.
She did not, however, give Lyttleton much encouragement. As she had said to Dale, she could not forbid him the house, neither could she avoid being in the same room with him when there, as no other, the kitchen excepted, was warm enough for comfort at that inclement season, nor could she prevent his joining her in the street.
She usually declined his attentions when it could be done without positive rudeness, yet he persevered, the prize seeming to him all the more valuable because of its difficulty of acquisition.
Dale looked on with vexation and a growing dislike to Lyttleton; but Clare gave the latter her countenance, making him always welcome to the house, saying little things that flattered his vanity, and vaguely hinting that Nell was capricious and might be won in time by clever courting.
The major was apparently oblivious of the whole matter, while the gossips of the town compared notes and speculated as to the probability that the Englishman's suit would eventually prosper.
These queries and conjectures now and then reached Kenneth's ears, inflicting a sharp pang all unsuspected by the talkers; for it had come to be the popular opinion that Dr. Clendenin was a confirmed bachelor, utterly indifferent to the charms of the softer sex; and not by word or tone, or so much as a change in the calm gravity of his demeanor, did he let them into the secret of his silent suffering.
And it was not slight; many a night of sleepless anguish it cost him to think how "his darling, his own precious little Nell," as he must call her, was being wiled away from him by one who could never, he was sure, half appreciate her worth, and was far from deserving so rich a prize.
But could it be possible that she would throw herself away thus, that she would give her hand without her heart? For was not that all his own, had not those beautiful, eloquent eyes betrayed her secret to him spite of herself? And yet, and yet—had he, beyond a doubt or peradventure, read that look aright? Oh, if he might but go to her, pour out the story of his love and sue for hers? But alas, alas, he dare not, 'twould be a more grievous wrong than to keep silent and let her think what she would of him.