Leo, much wondering that his master should leave his mistress at such a time, went out of the room to obey his orders.
Breakfast was soon served. Alexander dispatched it in haste, and then went up stairs to change his dress for his ride into town.
When he found himself alone in his dressing-room, all the embarrassments of his false position—forgotten during the exciting events that had followed his late arrival at home—were now recalled to mind.
In an hour or two he should meet his uncle and his cousin. The former would expect that he should make his proposal for immediate marriage with Anna, and the latter would be ready to meet it.
He might either make the anticipated proposal or omit to do it.
If he should make it, and his cousin should meet it favorably, the embarrassments of his position would be multiplied a thousand fold, for certainly he could not marry two wives; neither could he, after having committed himself by his proposal, confess his prior marriage.
If he should omit to make the proposal at all, such omission would subject him to suspicion and severe cross-examination by his uncle and the grandfather of his betrothed.
His first hope, then, was in being able to evade the dilemma by procrastination; and his second hope was that Anna herself might take the responsibility of insisting upon a further delay of the wedding.
As for his secret marriage with Drusilla, he was now resolved, come what might, that he would never reveal it; because he felt sure, if he should do so, that his uncle and cousin would both discard him, and she would become the wife of his rival.
But even in the midst of these evil thoughts, he started as an absent-minded walker might at seeing himself on the brink of a dreadful precipice,—yes, started with a sudden consciousness of what a villain he was growing to be—he who up to this time had been a man of stainless honor.