"Oh, close your eyes and strive to see
The studious maid with book on knee!"
Mary had not long luxuriated in this enjoyment, when a footstep sounded on the grass without, and a dark shadow obscured the bright light upon her page. Lifting up her eyes, she saw Eugene Trevor standing before her.
He smiled at her start of surprise, and apologised for the abrupt intrusion. He had expected, he stated, to have found her and his cousin Olivia in this, Mrs. de Burgh's usual morning-room; and then Mary—the bright glow with which, although not naturally nervous, this sudden apparition had coloured her cheek, fading gradually away—told him how Mrs. de Burgh was engaged in the adjoining room.
"And you have deserted her?" he said, taking up the book she had laid down and examining its contents with the greatest apparent interest, though he only smiled when she asked him if he were fond of poetry, smiled—and answered, looking into her face, "Some kind," and replaced the volume; then resting against the window-sill, they conversed on other subjects, and were still thus engaged when luncheon was announced.
Eugene Trevor stayed at Silverton that day and part of the next: when all the rest of the party took their departure, with the exception of Mr. de Burgh's own particular friend.
But, somehow or other, Mary had by this time begun to change her mind, and to think—that after all she might be rather fond of society.
One circumstance a little surprised and puzzled her, before she had been very long at Silverton.
One day, when speaking of Wales, she carelessly mentioned Mr. Temple's name, and alluded to the college acquaintance that gentleman had professed to have once subsisted between himself and Mr. de Burgh. But Mr. de Burgh remembered no person of that name, answering to the slight description she attempted to give—could not the least recall him to his recollection, and as Mrs. de Burgh and Eugene Trevor, who happened to be present, did not seem able to assist his memory in that respect—though Mary also remembered Mr. Temple to have claimed acquaintance with Mrs. de Burgh's family, she did not press the point; a certain conscious embarrassment associated with the object of discussion preventing her from entering into further particulars, though she thought the circumstance rather strange and unaccountable.
Her aunt and uncle mentioned in their first letter that Mr. Temple had called to see them, and had seemed much interested to hear of her safe arrival at Silverton; but those relatives did not remain in Wales more than a week or two after her own departure, therefore with them, intelligence regarding that most remarkable—and to her, now peculiarly interesting—person must cease, at least for the time being, she having no other correspondents at present in the neighbourhood.