Before tea these visions had come and vanished; often enough,
to be sure; now they came and stayed. I was very quiet, I am
certain of that; I was as certainly very sober, with a great
and growing sadness at my heart. I think Thorold was grave,
too, though I hardly looked at him. We did not speak to each
other, all the time the servant was busy in the room. We stood
silent before the fire. The study I had come to do had all
passed away out of my mind, though the books were within three
feet of me. I was growing sadder and sadder every minute.
"Things have changed, since we talked so lightly last summer
of what might be," — Thorold said at last. — And he said it in
a meditative way, as if he were pondering something.
"Yes" — I assented.
"The North does not wish for war. The South have brought it
upon themselves."
"Yes" — I said again; wondering a little what was coming.
"However disagreeable my duty may be, it is my duty; and there
is no shirking it."
"No," I said. "Of course."
"And if your friends are on one side and I on the other, — it
is not my fault, Miss Randolph.
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