And there was another reason which operated much with Crosbie, urging him on in his present mood and wishes, though it should have given an exactly opposite impulse to his heart.  He had hesitated as to marrying Lily Dale at once, because of the smallness of his income.  Now he had a prospect of considerable increase to that income.  One of the commissioners at his office had been promoted to some greater commissionership, and it was understood by everybody that the secretary at the General Committee Office would be the new commissioner.  As to that there was no doubt.  But then the question had arisen as to the place of secretary.  Crosbie had received two or three letters on the subject, and it seemed that the likelihood of his obtaining this step in the world was by no means slight.  It would increase his official income from seven hundred a year to twelve, and would place him altogether above the world.  His friend, the present secretary, had written to him, assuring him that no other probable competitor was spoken of as being in the field against him.  If such good fortune awaited him, would it not smooth any present difficulty which lay in the way of his marriage with Lily Dale?  But, alas, he had not looked at the matter in that light!  Might not the countess help him to this preferment?  And if his destiny intended for him the good things of this world,—­secretaryships, commissionerships, chairmanships, and such like, would it not be well that he should struggle on in his upward path by such assistance as good connections might give him?

He sat thinking over it all in his own room on that evening.  He had written twice to Lily since his arrival at Courcy Castle.  His first letter has been given.  His second was written much in the same tone; though Lily, as she had read it, had unconsciously felt somewhat less satisfied than she had been with the first.  Expressions of love were not wanting, but they were vague and without heartiness.  They savoured of insincerity, though there was nothing in the words themselves to convict them.  Few liars can lie with the full roundness and self-sufficiency of truth; and Crosbie, bad as he was, had not yet become bad enough to reach that perfection.  He had said nothing to Lily of the hopes of promotion which had been opened to him; but he had again spoken of his own worldliness,—­acknowledging that he received an unsatisfying satisfaction from the pomps and vanities of Courcy Castle.  In fact he was paving the way for that which he had almost resolved that he would do, now he had told Lady Alexandrina that he loved her; and he was obliged to confess to himself that the die was cast.