His situation is really
pitiably comic--with an intriguing mistress, a saintly wife, and a devil
of a jealous temper of his own. I shall meet Mary on reaching town. Has
Clavering (shabby dog!) paid his I.O.U. yet? Tell the little opera woman
she had better be quiet. She ought to know me by this time; I shall do
what is right, but won't submit to be bullied. If she is troublesome,
snap your fingers at her, on my behalf, and leave her to her remedy. I
have written to Gray, to get things at Wynston in order. She will draw
upon you for what money she requires. Send down two or three of the
servants, if they have not already gone. The place is very dusty and
dingy, and needs a great deal of brushing and scouring. I shall see you
in town very soon. By the way, has the claret I ordered from the Dublin
house arrived yet? It is consigned to you, and goes by the 'Lizard'; pay
the freightage, and get Edwards to pack it; ten dozen or so may as well
go down to Wynston, and send other wines in proportion. I leave details
to you...."

Some further directions upon other subjects followed; and having
subscribed the dispatch, and addressed it to the gentlemanlike scoundrel
who filled the onerous office of factotum to this profligate and
exacting man of the world, Sir Wynston Berkley rang his bell, and gave
the two letters into the hand of his man, with special directions to
carry them himself in person, to the post office in the neighboring
village, early next morning. These little matters completed, Sir Wynston
stirred his fire, leaned back in his easy chair, and smiled blandly over
the sunny prospect of his imaginary triumphs. It here becomes necessary to describe, in a few words, some of the local
relations of Sir Wynston's apartments. The bedchamber which he occupied
opened from the long passage of which we have already spoken--and there
were two other smaller apartments opening from it in train. In the
further of these, which was entered from a lobby, communicating by a back
stair with the kitchen and servants' apartments, lay Sir Wynston's valet,
and the intermediate chamber was fitted up as a dressing room for the
baronet himself. These circumstances it is necessary to mention, that
what follows may be clearly intelligible. While the baronet was penning these records of vicious schemes--dire
waste of wealth and time--irrevocable time!--Marston paced his study in a
very different frame of mind. There were a gloom and disorder in the room
accordant with those of his own mind. Shelves of ancient tomes, darkened
by time, and upon which the dust of years lay sleeping--dark oaken
cabinets, filled with piles of deeds and papers, among which the nimble
spiders were crawling--and, from the dusky walls, several stark, pale
ancestors, looking down coldly from their tarnished frames. An hour, and
another hour passed--and still Marston paced this melancholy chamber, a
prey to his own fell passions and dark thoughts. He was not a
superstitious man, but, in the visions which haunted him, perhaps, was
something which made him unusually excitable--for, he experienced a chill
of absolute horror, as, standing at the farther end of the room, with his
face turned towards the entrance, he beheld the door noiselessly and
slowly pushed open, by a pale, thin hand, and a figure dressed in a loose
white robe, glide softly in. He stood for some seconds gazing upon this
apparition, as it moved hesitatingly towards him from the dusky extremity
of the large apartment, before he perceived that the form was that of
Mrs. Marston. "Hey, ha!--Mrs. Marston--what on earth has called you hither?" he asked,
sternly. "You ought to have been at rest an hour ago; get to your
chamber, and leave me, I have business to attend to." "Now, dear Richard, you must forgive me," she said, drawing near, and
looking up into his haggard face with a sweet and touching look of
timidity and love; "I could not rest until I saw you again; your looks
have been all this night so unlike yourself; so strange and terrible,
that I am afraid some great misfortune threatens you, which you fear to
tell me of." "My looks! Why, curse it, must I give an account of my looks?" replied
Marston, at once disconcerted and wrathful. "Misfortune! What misfortune
can befall us more? No, there is nothing, nothing, I say, but your own
foolish fancy; go to your room--go to sleep--my looks, indeed; pshaw!" "I came to tell you, dear Richard, that I will do, in all respects, just
as you desire. If you continue to wish it, I will part with poor
mademoiselle; though, indeed, Richard, I shall miss her more than you can
imagine; and all your suspicions have wronged her deeply," said Mrs.
Marston. Her husband darted a sudden flashing glance of suspicious
scrutiny upon her face; but its expression was frank, earnest, noble. He
was disarmed; he hung his head gloomily upon his breast, and was silent
for a time. She came nearer, and laid her hand upon his arm. He looked
darkly into her upturned eyes, and a feeling which had not touched his
heart for many a day--an emotion of pity, transient, indeed, but vivid,
revisited him. He took her hand in his, and said, in gentler terms than
she had heard him use for a long time--

"No, indeed, Gertrude, you have deceived yourself; no misfortune has
happened, and if I am gloomy, the source of all my troubles is within. Leave me, Gertrude, for the present. As to the other matter, the
departure of Mademoiselle de Barras, we can talk of that tomorrow--now I
cannot; so let us part. Go to your room; good night." She was withdrawing, and he added, in a subdued tone--"Gertrude, I am
very glad you came--very glad. Pray for me tonight." He had followed her a few steps toward the door, and now stopped short,
turned about, and walked dejectedly back again--

"I am right glad she came," he muttered, as soon as he was once more
alone. "Wynston is provoking and fiery, too. Were I, in my present mood,
to seek a tête-à-tête with him, who knows what might come of it? Blood;
my own heart whispers--blood! I'll not trust myself." He strode to the study door, locked it, and taking out the key, shut it
in the drawer of one of the cabinets. "Now it will need more than accident or impulse to lead me to him. I
cannot go, at least, without reflection, without premeditation. Avaunt,
fiend. I have baffled you." He stood in the center of the room, cowering and scowling as he said
this, and looked round with a glance half-defiant, half-fearful, as if he
expected to see some dreadful form in the dusky recesses of the desolate
chamber. He sat himself by the smouldering fire, in somber and agitated
rumination. He was restless; he rose again, unbuckled his sword, which he
had not loosed since evening, and threw it hastily into a corner. He
looked at his watch, it was half-past twelve; he glanced at the door, and
thence at the cabinet in which he had placed the key; then he turned
hastily, and sate down again.