take him,
and I know well that nothing that I can say will turn you. But I
believe that when he has spent all your money he will not take you,
and that thus you will be saved. Thinking as I do about him, you can
hardly expect that I should triumph because he has got himself into
Parliament with your money!"

Then he left her, and it seemed to Alice that he had been very cruel.
There had been little, she thought, nay, nothing of a father's loving
tenderness in his words to her. If he had spoken to her differently,
might she not even now have confessed everything to him? But herein
Alice accused him wrongfully. Tenderness from him on this subject
had, we may say, become impossible. She had made it impossible. Nor
could he tell her the extent of his wishes without damaging his own
cause. He could not let her know that all that was done was so done
with the view of driving her into John Grey's arms.

But what words were those for a father to speak to a daughter! Had
she brought herself to such a state that her own father desired to
see her deserted and thrown aside? And was it probable that this wish
of his should come to pass? As to that, Alice had already made up
her mind. She thought that she had made up her mind that she would
never become her cousin's wife. It needed not her father's wish to
accomplish her salvation, if her salvation lay in being separated
from him.

On the next morning George went to her. The reader will, perhaps,
remember their last interview. He had come to her after her letter to
him from Westmoreland, and had asked her to seal their reconciliation
with a kiss; but she had refused him. He had offered to embrace her,
and she had shuddered before him, fearing his touch, telling him by
signs much more clear than any words, that she felt for him none of
the love of a woman. Then he had turned from her in anger, declaring
to her honestly that he was angry. Since that he had borrowed her
money,--had made two separate assaults upon her purse,--and was now
come to tell her of the results. How was he to address her? I beg
that it may be also remembered that he was not a man to forget the
treatment he had received. When he entered the room, Alice looked at
him, at first, almost furtively. She was afraid of him. It must be
confessed that she already feared him. Had there been in the man
anything of lofty principle he might still have made her his slave,
though I doubt whether he could ever again have for