The poor girl's emotion, in fact, was of a twofold character; she wept with joy at Reilly's escape from the hands of his cruel and relentless enemy, and with bitter grief at the impossibility which she thought there existed that he should ultimately be able to keep out of the meshes which she knew Whitecraft would spread for him.

The tears, however, which she shed abundantly, in due time relieved her, and in the course of an hour or two she was able to appear as usual in the family.
The reader may perceive that her father, though of an abrupt and cynical temper, was not a man naturally of a bad or unfeeling heart.

Whatever mood of temper chanced to be uppermost influenced him for the time; and indeed it might be said that one half of his feelings were usually in a state of conflict with the other.

In matters of business he was the very soul of integrity and honor, but in his views of public affairs he was uncertain and inconsistent; and of course his whole life, as a magistrate and public man, was a perpetual series of contradictions.

The consequence of all this was, that he possessed but small influence, as arising from his personal character; but not so from his immense property, as well as from the fact that he was father to the wealthiest and most beautiful heiress in the province, or perhaps, so far as beauty was concerned, in the kingdom itself.
At length the day mentioned for the dinner arrived, and, at the appointed hour, so also did the guests.