I shall make good use of the Dolemanic hint of being married. But I will not tell thee all at once. Nor, indeed, have I thoroughly digested that part of my plot. When a general must regulate himself by the motions of a watchful adversary, how can he say beforehand what he will, or what he will not, do?
Widow SINCLAIR, didst thou not say, Lovelace?—
Ay, SINCLAIR, Jack!—Remember the name! SINCLAIR, I repeat. She has no other. And her features being broad and full-blown, I will suppose her to be of Highland extraction; as her husband the colonel [mind that too] was a Scot, as brave, as honest.
I never forget the minutiae in my contrivances. In all matters that admit of doubt, the minutiae, closely attended to and provided for, are of more service than a thousand oaths, vows, and protestations made to supply the neglect of them, especially when jealousy has made its way in the working mind.
Thou wouldst wonder if thou knewest one half of my providences. To give thee but one—I have already been so good as to send up a list of books to be procured for the lady's closet, mostly at second hand. And thou knowest that the women there are all well read. But I will not anticipate—Besides, it looks as if I were afraid of leaving any thing to my old friend CHANCE; which has many a time been an excellent second to me, and ought not be affronted or despised; especially by one who has the art of making unpromising incidents turn out in his favour.
LETTER XL
MISS HOWE, TO MISS CLARISSA HARLOWE WEDNESDAY, APRIL 19.
I have a piece of intelligence to give you, which concerns you much to know.
Your brother having been assured that you are not married, has taken a resolution to find you out, waylay you, and carry you off. A friend of his, a captain of a ship, undertakes to get you on ship-board, and to sail away with you, either to Hull or Leith, in the way to one of your brother's houses.