Love! He had left that land behind, and she had never touched its shores; the geography of the poets to the contrary, it did not lie in the course of all who passed through life.

He made his suit, and now he had his answer.
If he did not take trouble to wonder at her confession, or to modestly ask himself how he had deserved her love, neither did he insult her with pity or with any lightness of thought.

Nor was he ready to believe that his rejection was final.

Apparently indifferent as he was, it was yet his way to move steadily and relentlessly, if very quietly, toward what goal he desired to reach.

He thought that Fair View might yet call Evelyn Byrd its mistress.
Since turning into the crossroad that, running south and east, would take him back to the banks of the James and to his own house, he had not slackened speed, but now, as he saw through the trees before him a long zigzag of rail fence, he drew rein.