And how could she suspect Caterine to have been the agent of that gentleman, when she knew now that her object in seeking an interview with herself was to put her on her guard against him?
The case was clear, and, to her, dreadful as it was clear.

She felt herself now, however, in that mood which no sympathy can alleviate or remove.

She experienced no wish to communicate her distress to any one, but resolved to preserve the secret in her own bosom.

Here, then, was she left to suffer the weight of a twofold affliction--the dread of Woodward, with which Caterine's intelligence had filled her heart, feeble, and timid, and credulous as it was upon any subject of a superstitious tendency--and the still deeper distress which weighed her down in consequence of Charles Lindsay's treachery and dishonor.

Alas! poor Alice's heart was not one for struggles, nurtured and bred up, as she had been, in the very wildest spirit of superstition, in all its degrading ramifications.