She was right in believing that Mr. Redmain disliked her, but she
was wrong in imagining that he had therefore any objection to her
being for the present in the house. He certainly did not relish
the idea of her continuing to be his wife's inseparable
companion, but there would be time enough to get rid of her after
he had found her out. For she had not long been one of his
_family,_ before he knew, with insight unerring, that she
had to be found out, and was therefore an interesting subject for
the exercise of his faculty of moral analysis. He was certain her
history was composed mainly of secrets. As yet, however, he had
discovered nothing.
I must just remind my reader of the intellectual passion I have
already mentioned as characterizing Mr. Redmain's mental
constitution. His faults and vices were by no means peculiar; but
the bent to which I refer, certainly no virtue, and springing
originally from predominant evil, was in no small degree
peculiar, especially in the degree to which, derived as it was
from his father, he had in his own being developed it. Most men,
he judged with himself, were such fools as well as rogues, that
there was not the least occasion to ask what they were after:
they did but turn themselves inside out before you! But, on the
other hand, there were not a few who took pains, more or less
successful, to conceal their game of life; and such it was the
delight of his being to lay bare to his own eyes-not to those of
other people; that, he said, would be to spoil his game! Men were
his library, he said-his history, his novels, his sermons, his
philosophy, his poetry, his whole literature--and he did not like
to have his books thumbed by other people.
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