I can only wander up and down." "That sounds like a creed of fatalism." "It is not a creed; it is a matter of nerves.

A creed has its 'kismet.' The nerves are wild horses." "It is something to be fought against," said Cornelia admonishingly.
"Is it something to be distrusted ?" "I should say, yes." "Then I was wrong ?" He stooped eagerly, in his temperate way, to catch sight of her answering face.

Cornelia's quick cheeks took fire.

She fenced with a question of two, and stood in a tremble, marvelling at his intuition.
For possibly, at that moment when he stood watching her window-light (ah, poor heart!) she was half-pledging her word to her sisters (in a whirl of wrath at Wilfrid, herself, and the world), that she would take the lead in breaking up Brookfield.
An event occurred that hurried them on.

They received a visit from their mother's brother, John Pierson, a Colonel of Uhlans, in the Imperial-Royal service.