--C. B._"
Victor Carrington read this note with a smile of satisfaction, which
faithfully interpreted the feelings it produced. There was a business-
like tone in his correspondent's letter which exactly suited his ideas
of what it was advisable his agent should be.
"She is really admirable," he said, as he destroyed Miss Brewer's note;
"just clever enough to be useful, just shrewd enough to understand the
precise force and weight of an argument, but not clever enough, or
shrewd enough, to find out that she is used for any purpose but the one
for which she has bargained."
And then Victor Carrington wrote a few lines to Miss Brewer, in which
he thanked her for her note, and prepared her to receive a visit from
him on the following day. This written and posted, he walked up and
down his laboratory, in deep thought for some time, and then once more
seated himself at his desk. This time his communication was addressed
to Sir Reginald Eversleigh, and merely consisted of a request that that
gentleman should call upon him--Victor Carrington--on a certain day, at
a week's distance from the present date.
"I shall have more trouble with this shallow fool than with all the
rest of them," said Victor to himself, as he sealed his letter; and,
as he said it, he permitted his countenance to assume a very unusual
expression of vexation; "his vanity will make him kick against letting
Paulina turn him off; and he will run the risk of destroying the game
sooner than suffer that mortification.
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