d was aware that his
brother stood between him and his expectations, experienced a feeling of
vengeance against him and Alice, which he neither could, nor attempted
to, restrain. The rage of his mother, too, when she heard that the
latter had rejected him, and avowed her attachment to Charles, went
beyond all bounds. Her son, however, who possessed a greater restraint
upon his feelings, and was master of more profound hypocrisy and
cunning, requested her to conceal the attachment of Alice to his
brother, as a matter not to be disclosed on any account.

"Leave me to my resources," said he, "and it will go hard or I will
so manage Charles as to disentangle him from the consequences of her
influence over him. But the families, mother, must not be for the
present permitted to visit again. On the contrary, it is better for our
purposes that they should not see each other as formerly, nor resume
their intimacy. If you suffer your passions to overcome you, even in our
own family, the consequence is that you prevent us both from playing our
game as we ought, and as we shall do. Leave Charles to me; I shall make
O'Connor of use, too; but above all things do not breathe a syllable to
any one of them of my having been thrown off. I think, as it is, I have
damped her ardor for him a little, and if she had not been obstinate and
foolishly romantic, I would have extinguished it completely. As it is,
I told her to leave the truth of what I mentioned to her respecting him,
to time, and if she does I shall rest satisfied. Will you now be guided
by me, my dear mother?"

"I will endeavor to do so," she replied; "but it will be a terrible
restraint upon me, and I scarcely know how I shall be able to keep
myself calm. I will try, however; the object is worth it. You know if
she dies without issue the property reverts to you."

"Yes, mother, the object is worth much more than the paltry sacrifice
I ask of you. Keep yourself quiet, then, and we will accomplish our
purposes yet. I shall set instruments to work who will ripen our
projects, and, I trust, ultimately accomplish them."

"Why, what instruments do you intend to use?"

"I know the girl's disposition and character well. I have learned much
concerning her from Casey, who is often there as a suitor for the fair
hand of her favorite maid. Casey, however, is a man in whom I can place
no confidence; he is too much attached to the rest of the family, and
does not at all relish me. I wil