got it all
from him. She was very indignant at many of the things; but as for Sir
Charles, all his cousin's arrows glided off that high-minded gentleman,
except one, and that quivered in his heart. "Yes, Bella," said he, "he
told me he should inherit these estates. That is because we are not
blessed with children."

Lady Bassett sighed. "But we shall be some day. Shall we not?"

"God knows," said Sir Charles, gloomily. "I wonder whether there was
really anything unfair done on our side when the entail was cut off?"

"Is that likely, dearest? Why?"

"Heaven seems to be on his side."

"On the side of a wicked man?"

"But he may be the father of innocent children."

"Why, he is not even married."

"He will marry. He will not throw a chance away. It makes my head
dizzy, and my heart sick. Bella, now I can understand two enemies
meeting alone in some solitary place, and one killing the other in a
moment of rage; for when this scoundrel insulted me I remembered his
anonymous letter, and all his relentless malice. Bella, I could have
raised my gun and shot him like a weasel."

Lady Bassett screamed faintly, and flung her arms round his neck. "Oh,
Charles, pray to God against such thoughts. You shall never go near
that man again. Don't think of our one disappointment: think of all the
blessings we enjoy. Never mind that wretched man's hate. Think of your
wife's love. Have I not more power to make you happy than he has to
afflict you, my adored?" These sweet words were accompanied by a wife's
divine caresses; with the honey of her voice, and the liquid sunshine
of her loving eyes. Sir Charles slept peacefully that night, and forgot
his one grief and his one enemy for a time.

Not so Lady Bassett. She lay awake all night and thought deeply of
Richard Bassett and "his unrelenting, impenitent malice." Women of her
fine fiber, when they think long and earnestly on one thing, have often
divinations. The dark future seems to be lit a moment at a time by
flashes of lightning, and they discern the indistinct form of events to
come, And so it was with Lady Bassett: in the stilly night a terror of
the future and of Richard Bassett crept over her--a terror
disproportioned to his past acts and apparent power. Perhaps she was
oppressed by having an enemy--she, who was born to be loved. At all
events, she was full of feminine divinations and forebodings, and saw,
by flashes, many a poisoned arrow fly from that quiver and strike th