The Opera-house was very full and proportionably hot on the evening when Coverdale and his wife visited it (it being the _début_ of the since famous Signora Bettimartini), Alice, unused to London gaieties, and uneasy from the suspicions she could not contrive to banish, acquired a headache, which, when she went to bed, prevented her from falling asleep. Thus, being anxious to court without loss of time nature’s sweet restorer, of course she chose the most vexatious and exciting topic she could select as a subject of thought, and began to speculate on all the evidence she could call to mind in regard to her husband’s relations, past and present, towards Arabella Crofton, who, as the reader must have perceived, was just at that especial epoch poor little Mrs. Coverdale’s _bête noire_. The first circumstance she could recollect to form the initial link in her chain of evidence, was Harry’s inquiry about her when Alice casually mentioned her name during the halcyon days of their honeymoon. In this conversation, Harry had confessed to a previous acquaintance with Miss Crofton, and when pressed farther, added that he knew no good of her, or words to that effect. His manner, Alice remembered, was so peculiar that her curiosity had been at once excited, or as she mentally put it, that “naturally she felt her husband ought immediately to have told her everything about it--_she_ had no concealments from him, she was sure.” Following up this train of thought, another instance of this unkind and unflattering want of confidence occurred to her--the mysterious epistle which he had received that very afternoon, which had annoyed him so much, and about which he had refused to afford her any explanation; and here a new idea flashed like an infernal inspiration across her brain--could that note be in any way connected with Miss Crofton’s arrival? “Yes! it must be so.” She remembered when they entered the drawing-room, and she had felt surprise at finding a stranger there, Harry seemed to take it as a matter of course: good reason why, he knew it previously--this hateful woman, this detestable creature, Arabella Crofton, had written to him privately, informing him of her arrival! Oh! she saw it all; and how she would try to wean his affections away from his poor wife--his poor, neglected, betrayed wife! and succeed most likely--men were such fickle, wicked things; and then it would break her heart, _that_ there could be no question of and she should die in the course of a year--in six months, very likely, for she wasn’t at all strong though she had a colour--consumptive people always had brilliant complexions--think of her poor aunt Kitty! and Harry would be sorry when it was too late, perhaps. And so, drawing a vivid picture of her repentant husband grieving over her untimely decease, she cried herself to sleep, bedewing with her tears the “fickle, wicked thing,” calmly slumbering at her side; who straightway dreamed that, being out hunting, and riding