This was all progress for Cornelia, and she well knew it, and yet she was not at ease nor satisfied. She began to find out that it was no such light matter to usurp the place of such a woman as Sophie, though the latter was laboring under the great disadvantage of being ignorant of the plot against her. In most cases, indeed, the attempt would have been wellnigh hopeless, but Cornelia had two exceptionally powerful allies--her own supreme beauty, and Bressant's untrained and ill-regulated animal nature, which he had not yet learned to understand and provide against. And there was another thing in her favor, too, although she knew it not--the demoralizing effect upon the young man's character--of his failure to fulfil his agreement with the professor. The evils that are in us link themselves together to drag us down, their essential quality being identical, whatever their particular application. Nevertheless, time went on, and November had stalked shivering away before the frosty breath of December, and still Cornelia had accomplished nothing definite; nay, she scarcely felt sufficiently sure of her footing to attempt any thing. And what was it that she was to attempt? On looking this question in the face, at close quarters--it wanted less than four weeks now of that wedding-day which Cornelia had promised herself should see no wedding!--when she found herself pressed so peremptorily as this for an answer, it might be imagined that she turned pale at what was before her. And, indeed, the prospect, viewed in its best light, was discouraging and desperate enough. For at what price to herself must success be bought, and at what sacrifice be enjoyed? She must either lose, or deserve to lose, all that a woman ought to hold most sacred and most dear--home, the esteem and love of friends, the protection of truth, and, above all, and worst of all, her own self-respect. All these in exchange for a baffled, angry, selfish man, at whose mercy she would be, with only one word to speak in self-defense and justification; and it was much to be feared that he would, considering the circumstances, reject and scoff at even that. The one word was--she loved him! and, if there be any redeeming virtue in it, let her, in Heaven's name, have the benefit thereof. She can rely on nothing else. But Cornelia would not be disheartened. If she saw the rocks ahead, against whose fatal shoulders she was being swept--if she heard, dinning in her ears, the rush and roar of the headlong, irresistible rapids--if her eyes could penetrate the void which opened darkly beyond--she only nerved herself the more resolutely, her glance was all the firmer, her determination the more unfaltering.