What was more natural than that John Saltram should have found his doom, as he had found it, unthought of, undreamed of, swift, and fatal?
Nor was it difficult for him to believe that Marian--who had perhaps never really loved him, who had been induced to accept him by his own pertinacity and her uncle's eager desire for the match--should find a charm and a power in John Saltram that had been wanting in himself.

He had seen too many instances of his friend's influence over men and women, to doubt his ability to win this innocent inexperienced girl, had he set himself to win her.

He recalled with a bitter smile how his informants had all described his rival in a disparaging tone, as unworthy of so fair a bride; and he knew that it was precisely those qualities which these common people were unable to appreciate that constituted the subtle charm by which John Saltram influenced others.

The rugged power and grandeur of that dark face, which vulgar critics denounced as plain and unattractive, the rare fascination of a manner that varied from an extreme reserve to a wild reckless vivacity, the magic of the deep full voice, with its capacity for the expression of every shade of emotion--these were attributes to be passed over and ignored by the vulgar, yet to exercise a potent influence upon sensitive sympathetic natures.
"How that poor little Anglo-Indian widow loves him, without any effort to win or hold her affection on his side!" Gilbert said to himself, as he walked back to Lidford in the darkening November afternoon, brooding always on the one subject which occupied all his thoughts; "and can I doubt his power to supersede me if he cared to do so--if he really loved Marian, as he never has loved Mrs.Branston?
What shall I do?
Go to him at once, and tell him my suspicion, tax him broadly with treachery, and force him to a direct confession or denial?
Shall I do this?
Or shall I bide my time, wait and watch with dull dogged patience, till I can collect some evidence of his guilt?
Yes, let it be so.

If he has been base enough to do me this great wrong--mean enough to steal my betrothed under a false name, and to keep the secret of his wrong-doing at any cost of lies and deceit--let him go on to the end, let him act out the play to the last; and when I bring his falsehood home to him, as I must surely do, sooner or later,--yes, if he is capable of deceiving me, he shall continue the lie to the last, he shall endure all the infamy of his false position." And then, after a pause, he said to himself,-- "And at the end, if my suspicions are confirmed, I shall have lost all I have ever valued in life since my mother died--my plighted wife, and the one chosen friend whose companionship could make existence pleasant to me.