Page:Poems Hoffman.djvu/550

But heeding not the beauty 'round her spread
Turns to the novel in her idle hand,
And soon is lost to all the world without,
Roaming within some fancied fairyland,
Mingling with heroines of charmed romance.

The story done, she lays the book aside,
And o'er her face falls an unpleasant cloud,
As conning some deep problem in her mind,
Unconsciously she speaks her thoughts aloud,
Thoughts not unlike the cloud her features wear:

"Shall I be baffled by a simple child,
In this one conquest I have vowed to win?
I shall have my way and gain my ends,
I never fail in what I once begin;
Estella, shall yet be a rival there,
He would avoid me, yes, 'tis well—
He knows his weakness, but I know my power—
She trusts him in her simple innocence,
But she will live to hate and rue the hour
When she presumed to wander in my way;
I will accomplish what I have begun,
What beauty and what wit have failed to do,
And they have very seldom failed before,
Scheming and stratagem shall carry through;
Yes, I will try the merits of my plan."

With a low laugh she rises from her seat,
And leaves the garden wrapped in solitude;
The birds have hushed their merry twitterings;
And o'er the flowers the twilight shadows brood;
The sun has said "good-night" and set behind the hills.

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