fixed resolves, though in life they are so seldom
found to be thus armed. To speak the truth, the countess had had no
fixed resolve in the matter, either when she had thought about Owen's
coming, or when, subsequently, she had found herself alone with him
in her drawing-room. That Clara should not marry him,--on so much
she had resolved long ago. But all danger on that head was, it may
be said, over. Clara, like a good child, had behaved in the best
possible manner; had abandoned her first lover, a lover that was poor
and unfitted for her, as soon as told to do so; and had found for
herself a second lover, who was rich, and proper, and in every way
desirable. As regards Clara, the countess felt herself to be safe;
and, to give her her due, she had been satisfied that the matter
should so rest. She had not sought any further interview with
Fitzgerald. He had come there against her advice, and she had gone to
meet him prompted by the necessity of supporting her daughter, and
without any other views of her own.

But when she found herself alone with him; when she looked into his
face, and saw how handsome, how noble, how good it was--good in its
inherent manliness and bravery--she could not but long that this feud
should be over, and that she might be able once more to welcome him
as her friend. If only he would give up this frantic passion, this
futile, wicked, senseless attempt to make them all wretched by an
insane marriage, would it not be sweet again to make some effort to
rescue him from the evil ways into which he had fallen?

But Owen himself would make no response to this feeling. Clara
Desmond was his love, and he would, of his own consent, yield her to
no one. In truth, he was, in a certain degree, mad on this subject.
He did think that because the young girl had given him a promise--had
said to him a word or two which he called a promise--she was now of
right his bride; that there belonged to him an indefeasible property
in her heart, in her loveliness, in the inexpressible tenderness of
her young springing beauty, of which no subsequent renouncing on her
part could fairly and honestly deprive him. That others should oppose
the match was intelligible to him; but it was hardly intelligible
that she should betray him. And, as yet, he did not believe that she
herself was the mainspring of this renouncing. Others, the countess
and the Castle Richmond people, had frightened her into falseness;
and, therefore, it b