Mrs.Graham and I are two friends--and will be; and no man breathing shall hinder it,--or has a right to interfere between us.' 'But if you knew how they talk you would be more careful, for her sake as well as for your own.

Jane Wilson thinks your visits to the old hall but another proof of her depravity--' 'Confound Jane Wilson!' 'And Eliza Millward is quite grieved about you.' 'I hope she is.' 'But I wouldn't, if I were you.' 'Wouldn't what ?--How do they know that I go there ?' 'There's nothing hid from them: they spy out everything.' 'Oh, I never thought of this!--And so they dare to turn my friendship into food for further scandal against her!--That proves the falsehood of their other lies, at all events, if any proof were wanting .-- Mind you contradict them, Rose, whenever you can.' 'But they don't speak openly to me about such things: it is only by hints and innuendoes, and by what I hear others say, that I knew what they think.' 'Well, then, I won't go to-day, as it's getting latish.

But oh, deuce take their cursed, envenomed tongues!' I muttered, in the bitterness of my soul.
And just at that moment the vicar entered the room: we had been too much absorbed in our conversation to observe his knock.

After his customary cheerful and fatherly greeting of Rose, who was rather a favourite with the old gentleman, he turned somewhat sternly to me:-- 'Well, sir!' said he, 'you're quite a stranger.

It is--let--me--see,' he continued, slowly, as he deposited his ponderous bulk in the arm-chair that Rose officiously brought towards him; 'it is just--six-weeks--by my reckoning, since you darkened--my--door!' He spoke it with emphasis, and struck his stick on the floor.
'Is it, sir ?' said I.
'Ay! It is so!' He added an affirmatory nod, and continued to gaze upon me with a kind of irate solemnity, holding his substantial stick between his knees, with his hands clasped upon its head.
'I have been busy,' I said, for an apology was evidently demanded.
'Busy!' repeated he, derisively.
'Yes, you know I've been getting in my hay; and now the harvest is beginning.' 'Humph!' Just then my mother came in, and created a diversion in my favour by her loquacious and animated welcome of the reverend guest.