I have repaid them for that.' 'Pray be silent, Louisa,' said Evan, getting up hastily, for the sick sensation Rose had experienced came over him.

His sister's plots, her untruth, her coarseness, clung to him and seemed part of his blood.
He now had a personal desire to cut himself loose from the wretched entanglement revealed to him, whatever it cost.
'Are you really, truly going ?' Caroline exclaimed, for he was near the door.
'At a quarter to twelve at night!' sneered the Countess, still imagining that he, like herself, must be partly acting.
'But, Van, is it--dearest, think! is it manly for a brother to go and tell of his sister?
And how would it look ?' Evan smiled.

'Is it that that makes you unhappy?
Louisa's name will not be mentioned--be sure of that.' Caroline was stooping forward to him.

Her figure straightened: 'Good Heaven, Evan! you are not going to take it on yourself?
Rose!--she will hate you.' 'God help me!' he cried internally.
'Oh, Evan, darling! consider, reflect!' She fell on her knees, catching his hand.

'It is worse for us that you should suffer, dearest! Think of the dreadful meanness and baseness of what you will have to acknowledge.' 'Yes!' sighed the youth, and his eyes, in his extreme pain, turned to the Countess reproachfully.
'Think, dear,' Caroline hurried on, 'he gains nothing for whom you do this--you lose all.