will--the bridegroom from his bride; and Horace set his teeth, thinking of it. In that chain of resentful and selfish cogitations one idea followed another too rapidly to be checked. Horace could not help it, and was scarcely aware at first how the thought, vexatious and galling, stole into his mind, that Mr. Scarsdale was still in the fulness of his days, and might live to thwart him for many a long year. The red colour flushed deeper to his face, and his hand clenched involuntarily as the idea occurred to him. Day after day, and year after year, till his own youth had died out of his veins; till Amelia Stenhouse was out of his reach, and life and wealth had lost half their charms; that unlovely existence might linger on at Marchmain, and keep him out of his inheritance. What sudden rush of breathless suggestion, not daring to breathe in shape of words or definite expressions, flooded his mind for one violent moment after that we will not venture to say; but the next instant Horace wiped his wet forehead, on which great drops of moisture hung, and threw open the window to draw breath, and hide himself from himself. When he looked in again, he had made a violent effort, and turned his mind into another channel. Crime or madness--heaven knows which--lay the way he had been going, and the first glance had sickened him with mortal terror. He turned away from the dread unwilling thought with the first conscious effort against evil which he had ever made. The evil was monstrous, and appalled him: he was not bad enough to cogitate _that_, even in his most secret thoughts.