It had not been continued resentment against Bates that had made Eliza refuse Miss Rexford's request; it was the memory of the kiss with which he had bade her good-bye.

For two days she had been haunted by this memory, yet disregarded it, but when that night came, disturbed by Sophia's words, she locked out the world and took the thing to her heart to see of what stuff it was made.
Eliza lived her last interview with Bates over and over again, until she put out her light, and sat by her bedside alone in the darkness, and wondered at herself and at all things, for his farewell was like a lens through which she looked and the proportion of her world was changed.
There is strange fascination in looking at familiar scenes in unfamiliar aspect.

Even little children know this when, from some swinging branch, they turn their heads downwards, and see, not their own field, but fairyland.
Eliza glanced at her past while her sight was yet distorted, it might be, or quickened to clearer vision, by a new pulse of feeling; and, arrested, glanced again and again until she looked clearly, steadily, at the retrospect.

The lonely farm in the hills was again present to her eyes, the old woman, the father now dead, and this man.

Bates, stern and opinionated, who had so constantly tutored her.