Thus there was a certain distance, as it were, between them.
Baron Thyma could not, of course, be ignorant of the attachment between his daughter and Felix; yet as much as possible he ignored it.

He never referred to Felix; if his name was incidentally mentioned, he remained silent.

The truth was, he looked higher for Lady Aurora.

He could not in courtesy discourage even in the faintest manner the visits of his friend's son; the knightly laws of honour would have forbidden so mean a course.

Nor would his conscience permit him to do so, remembering the old days when he and the Baron were glad companions together, and how the Baron Aquila was the first to lead troops to his assistance in the gipsy war.