Perhaps the scheme had developed unconsciously, as often happens with persons whose lives are spent in planning.

Perhaps he fondly hoped--for he was not without vanity--that he might yet win the Countess fairly, and had only contemplated his plot as a possibility.

Be that as it may, from the moment he realised that a plan of action was necessary he also realised that the plan was ready, and he determined to put it into execution.

It was an unfair plan he meditated, bad from the root up, and he knew it; but he did not hesitate on that account.

Silas B.Barker junior had not enough conscience to make it an object for him to deceive himself as to the morality of his actions.