re liable to be defeated at any moment by a
passionate impulse such as the dark-hued races of Southern Europe and
their descendants are liable to. He lay in his bed, sometimes arranging
plans to meet the various difficulties already mentioned, sometimes
getting into a paroxysm of blind rage in the perplexity of considering
what object he should select as the one most clearly in his way. On the
whole, there could be no doubt where the most threatening of all his
embarrassments lay. It was in the probable growing relation between
Elsie and the schoolmaster. If it should prove, as it seemed likely,
that there was springing up a serious attachment tending to a union
between them, he knew what he should do, if he was not quite so sure how
he should do it.

There was one thing at least which might favor his projects, and which,
at any rate, would serve to amuse him. He could, by a little quiet
observation, find out what were the schoolmaster's habits of life:
whether he had any routine which could be calculated upon; and under
what circumstances a strictly private interview of a few minutes with
him might be reckoned on, in case it should be desirable. He could also
very probably learn some facts about Elsie: whether the young man was in
the habit of attending her on her way home from school; whether she
stayed about the school-room after the other girls had gone; and any
incidental matters of interest which might present themselves.

He was getting more and more restless for want of some excitement. A mad
gallop, a visit to Mrs. Blanche Creamer, who had taken such a fancy to
him, or a chat with the Widow Rowens, who was very lively in her talk,
for all her sombre colors, and reminded him a good deal of some of his
earlier friends, the _senoritas_,--all these were distractions, to be
sure, but not enough to keep his fiery spirit from fretting itself in
longings for more dangerous excitements. The thought of getting a
knowledge of all Mr. Bernard's ways, so that he would be in his power at
any moment, was a happy one.

For some days after this he followed Elsie at a long distance behind, to
watch her until she got to the school-house. One day he saw Mr. Bernard
join her: a mere accident, very probably, for it was only once this
happened. She came on her homeward way alone,--quite apart from the
groups of girls who strolled out of the school-house yard in company.
Sometimes she was behind them all,--which was suggestive. Coul