,
if everything worked well and favorably, Lady Hester herself was by
no means certain to wish for it the day after she had conquered all
opposition.

These, and many similar reasons, showed Sir Stafford that he might
safely concede a concurrence that need never become practical, and
making a merit of his necessity, he affected to yield to arguments that
had no value in his eyes.

"How do you propose to open the campaign, Hester?" asked he, after a
pause.

"I have arranged it all," said she, with animation. "We must visit the
Daltons together, or better still you shall go alone. No, no; a letter
will be the right thing, a very carefully written letter, that shall
refute by anticipation every possible objection to the plan, and show
the Daltons the enormous advantages they must derive from it."

"As, for instance?" said Sir Stafford, with apparent anxiety to be
instructed.

"Enormous they certainly will be!" exclaimed she. "First of all, Kate,
as I have said, is certain to marry well, and will be thus in a position
to benefit the others, who, poor things, can do nothing for themselves."

"Very true, my dear, very true. You see all these things far more
rapidly and more clearly than I do."

"I have thought so long and so much about it, I suppose there are few
contingencies of the case have escaped me; and now that I learn how you
once knew and were attached to the poor girl's mother--"

"I am sorry to rob you of so harmless an illusion," interrupted he,
smiling; "but I have already said I never saw her."

"Oh, you did say so! I forget all about it. Well, there was something or
other that brought the families in relation, no matter what, and it must
be a great satisfaction to you to see the breach restored, and through
my intervention, too; for I must needs say, Sir Stafford, there are
many women who would entertain a silly jealousy respecting one who once
occupied the first place in their husband's esteem."

"Must I once more assure you that this whole assumption is groundless;
that I never--"

"Quite enough; more than I ask for, more than I have any right to ask
for," broke she in. "If you did not interrupt me, and pardon me if I
say that this habit of yours is calculated to produce innumerable
misconceptions, I say that, if I had not been interrupted, I would have
told you that I regard such jealousies as most mean and unworthy. We
cannot be the arbiters of our affections any more than of our
fortunes; an