His vanity it was which had in the first instance been gratified--his vanity now suffered proportionately. And so irritable was his temper and so depressed his spirits, on his arrival in Cheltenham, that Alfred, who had but just returned from his interview with Caroline, felt that it would be mistimed to mention her, or allude at all at present to his own happier prospects. He limited the confidential conversation, therefore, to kind condolence with his brother, being too delicate to remind Willoughby that he might have escaped this mortification had he taken his advice. Thus was the foundation unintentionally laid of a concealment which finally led to many disastrous consequences. The moment Willoughby was introduced to Caroline he was captivated by her beauty. After they had danced together, when our heroine was so unexpectedly desired by her mother to dance with Alfred, Geoffery Arden, who may be termed Willoughby's evil genius, took possession of the seat beside him on the sofa, which had been just vacated by Caroline; and well knowing his cousin's weak point, said, "Well, that is one of the most pointed things I ever saw." "To what do you allude?" asked Willoughby. "Did you not see how mortified her ladyship looked at having her flirtation with you disturbed." "Flirtation, indeed!" repeated Willoughby, laughing; "the acquaintance is rather short for that, I should think." "Nay, we hear of love at first sight; and it was certainly something very like it. You were not many minutes in the room when you asked Lady Caroline to dance; and I don't know whether you noticed it, but a moment or two before Alfred, who has been so long acquainted, had made the same request; the lady pretended not to hear: she heard, however, when you spoke, and consented with marked alacrity." Willoughby's vanity, which had been so lately wounded, gladly welcomed suggestions so flattering. To woo and win the young, the beautiful, the rich Lady Caroline Montague, might well silence the jeers of those who were disposed to make impertinent comments on his late disappointment. As for Geoffery Arden's motive for offering the incense of flattery to Willoughby, it was the same which in most cases governs most men--self-interest. It was by the grossest flattery that he had long since made himself necessary to his cousin; and by the same means he still sought to retain an influence over him, which, in a pecuniary point of view, was particularly convenient to himself. On the present occasion also, he had seen with half a glance sufficient to make him suspect, at least, that Lady Caroline Montague was an object of interest to Alfred. If he was right in his conjecture, the circumstance might afford a favourable opportunity for sowing the seeds of dissension between the brothers, an object of which he never lost sight, well knowing that his own influence and that of Alfred could never go hand in hand--the one being for evil, the other for good.