She gazed on him as he slept, and looked back to the moment when he had first recognised her, and thought, was it possible one little hour could have worked such a wondrous revolution in her mind? The truth was, that Alicia had been a mistress of former days, on whom he had settled a handsome annuity at the very time when his absence from Lyneton had excited such surprise in the inhabitants of Rose Hill Lodge, and from whom he had then parted, as he intended for ever, but who had once more succeeded in getting him within her toils. For some time after his marriage he had neither heard nor seen any thing of her; but when he came to London in the spring, he received from her a letter, stating that she had been robbed of the money he allowed her—that she was deeply in debt, and was threatened with an execution in her house, and with the prospect of being sent to prison. He could not do otherwise than ascertain the truth of this history, and interfere to save her from such wretchedness. She was still very handsome, in deep grief, and in great agitation at again seeing him. He relieved her immediate wants, and occasionally visited her; for which visits she expressed the greatest gratitude, and from which she contrived to extract considerable additions to her allowance. He did not thoroughly believe in her passionate devotion to him, but he could not be cruel to a person who had acquired the sort of hold over him which is obtained by long habit. He did not consider that this renewal of his former acquaintance at all interfered with his making an excellent husband, for he treated his wife with all possible respect and attention; she had every thing that an unlimited command of money could procure her, and he imagined that the whole guilt of infidelity consisted in its coming to the knowledge, and consequently hurting the feelings, of the wife. If he had been obliged to make his election between them, he would not have hesitated for a moment; but there was nothing, to his mind, incompatible in the two connexions. In fact, his sentiments for Lucy had of late rather increased than diminished in warmth; for he could not but respect the singleness of heart with which she passed through the ordeal of a London season, so dangerous to a young and lovely married woman of high rank, and especially to one who was the fashion. As the mother of his son and heir, she had an additional claim on his affections that no other woman had ever possessed; and the attention with which she had nursed him had now awakened in his bosom stronger emotions of tenderness than he had thought himself capable of feeling. The expressions which fell from his lips came straight from his heart, although, at that moment, they appeared to Lucy to be an insulting refinement of deceit.