"Madame Goesler would laugh at me, no doubt."

"Psha! You do not think so. You know that she would not laugh. And are you the man to be afraid of a woman's laughter? I think not."

Again he did not answer her at once, and when he did speak the tone of his voice was altered. "What was it you said of yourself, just now?"

"What did I say of myself?"

"You regretted that you had consented to marry a man,--whom you did not love."

"Why should you not love her? And it is so different with a man! A woman is wretched if she does not love her husband, but I fancy that a man gets on very well without any such feeling. She cannot domineer over you. She cannot expect you to pluck yourself out of your own soil, and begin a new growth altogether in accordance with the laws of her own. It was that which Mr. Kennedy did."

"I do not for a moment think that she would take me, if I were to offer myself."

"Try her," said Lady Laura energetically. "Such trials cost you but little;--we both of us know that!" Still he said nothing of the letter in his pocket. "It is everything that you should go on now that you have once begun. I do not believe in you working at the Bar. You cannot do it. A man who has commenced life as you have done with the excitement of politics, who has known what it is to take a prominent part in the control of public affairs, cannot give it up and be happy at other work. Make her your wife, and you may resign or remain in office just as you choose. Office will be much easier to you than it is now, because it will not be a necessity. Let me at any rate have the pleasure of thinking that one of us can remain here,--that we need not both fall together."

Still he did not tell her of the letter in his pocket. He felt that she moved him,--that she made him acknowledge to himself how great would be the pity of such a failure as would be his. He was quite as much alive as she could be to the fact that work at the Bar, either in London or in Dublin, would have no charms for him now. The prospect of such a life was very dreary to him. Even with the comfort of Mary's love such a life would be very dreary to him. And then he knew,--he thought that he knew,--that were he to offer himself to Madame Goesler he would not in truth be rejected. She had told him that if poverty was a trouble to him he need be no longer poor. Of course he had understood this. Her money was at his service if he should choose to stoop and pick it up. And it was not only money that such a marriage would give him. He had acknowledged to himself more than once that Madame Goesler was very lovely, that she was clever, attractive in every way, and as far as he could see, blessed with a sweet temper. She had a position, too, in the world that would help him rather than mar him. What might he not do with an independent seat in the House of Commons, and as joint owner of the little house in Park Lane? Of all careers which the world could offer to a man the pleasantest would then be within his reach. "You appear to me as a tempter," he said at last to Lady Laura.

"It is unkind of you to say that, and ungrateful. I would do anything on earth in my power to help you."

"Nevertheless you are a tempter."

"I know how it ought to have been," she said, in a low voice. "I know very well how it ought to have been. I should have kept myself free till that time when we met on the braes of Loughlinter, and then all would have been well with us."

"I do not know how that might have been," said Phineas, hoa.r.s.ely.

"You do not know! But I know. Of course you have stabbed me with a thousand daggers when you have told me from time to time of your love for Violet. You have been very cruel,--needlessly cruel. Men are so cruel! But for all that I have known that I could have kept you,--had it not been too late when you spoke to me. Will you not own as much as that?"

"Of course you would have been everything to me. I should never have thought of Violet then."

"That is the only kind word you have said to me from that day to this. I try to comfort myself in thinking that it would have been so.

But all that is past and gone, and done. I have had my romance and you have had yours. As you are a man, it is natural that you should have been disturbed by a double image;--it is not so with me."

"And yet you can advise me to offer marriage to a woman,--a woman whom I am to seek merely because she is rich?"

"Yes;--I do so advise you. You have had your romance and must now put up with reality. Why should I so advise you but for the interest that I have in you? Your prosperity will do me no good. I shall not even be here to see it. I shall hear of it only as so many a woman banished out of England hears a distant misunderstood report of what is going on in the country she has left. But I still have regard enough,--I will be bold, and, knowing that you will not take it amiss, will say love enough for you,--to feel a desire that you should not be shipwrecked. Since we first took you in hand between us, Barrington and I, I have never swerved in my anxiety on your behalf. When I resolved that it would be better for us both that we should be only friends, I did not swerve. When you would talk to me so cruelly of your love for Violet, I did not swerve. When I warned you from Loughlinter because I thought there was danger, I did not swerve. When I bade you not to come to me in London because of my husband, I did not swerve. When my father was hard upon you, I did not swerve then. I would not leave him till he was softened.

When you tried to rob Oswald of his love, and I thought you would succeed,--for I did think so,--I did not swerve. I have ever been true to you. And now that I must hide myself and go away, and be seen no more, I am true still."

"Laura,--dearest Laura!" he exclaimed.

"Ah, no!" she said, speaking with no touch of anger, but all in sorrow;--"it must not be like that. There is no room for that. Nor do you mean it. I do not think so ill of you. But there may not be even words of affection between us--only such as I may speak to make you know that I am your friend."

"You are my friend," he said, stretching out his hand to her as he turned away his face. "You are my friend, indeed."

"Then do as I would have you do."

He put his hand into his pocket, and had the letter between his fingers with the purport of showing it to her. But at the moment the thought occurred to him that were he to do so, then, indeed, he would be bound for ever. He knew that he was bound for ever,--bound for ever to his own Mary; but he desired to have the privilege of thinking over such bondage once more before he proclaimed it even to his dearest friend. He had told her that she tempted him, and she stood before him now as a temptress. But lest it might be possible that she should not tempt in vain,--that letter in his pocket must never be shown to her. In that case Lady Laura must never hear from his lips the name of Mary Flood Jones.

He left her without any a.s.sured purpose;--without, that is, the a.s.surance to her of any fixed purpose. There yet wanted a week to the day on which Mr. Monk's bill was to be read,--or not to be read,--the second time; and he had still that interval before he need decide.

He went to his club, and before he dined he strove to write a line to Mary;--but when he had the paper before him he found that it was impossible to do so. Though he did not even suspect himself of an intention to be false, the idea that was in his mind made the effort too much for him. He put the paper away from him and went down and eat his dinner.

It was a Sat.u.r.day, and there was no House in the evening. He had remained in Portman Square with Lady Laura till near seven o'clock, and was engaged to go out in the evening to a gathering at Mrs.

Gresham's house. Everybody in London would be there, and Phineas was resolved that as long as he remained in London he would be seen at places where everybody was seen. He would certainly be at Mrs.

Gresham's gathering; but there was an hour or two before he need go home to dress, and as he had nothing to do, he went down to the smoking-room of his club. The seats were crowded, but there was one vacant; and before he had looked about him to scrutinise his neighbourhood, he found that he had placed himself with Bonteen on his right hand and Ratler on his left. There were no two men in all London whom he more thoroughly disliked; but it was too late for him to avoid them now.

They instantly attacked him, first on one side and then on the other.

"So I am told you are going to leave us," said Bonteen.

"Who can have been ill-natured enough to whisper such a thing?"

replied Phineas.

"The whispers are very loud, I can tell you," said Ratler. "I think I know already pretty nearly how every man in the House will vote, and I have not got your name down on the right side."

"Change it for heaven's sake," said Phineas.

"I will, if you'll tell me seriously that I may," said Ratler.

"My opinion is," said Bonteen, "that a man should be known either as a friend or foe. I respect a declared foe."

"Know me as a declared foe then," said Phineas, "and respect me."

"That's all very well," said Ratler, "but it means nothing. I've always had a sort of fear about you, Finn, that you would go over the traces some day. Of course it's a very grand thing to be independent."

"The finest thing in the world," said Bonteen; "only so d----d useless."

"But a man shouldn't be independent and stick to the ship at the same time. You forget the trouble you cause, and how you upset all calculations."

"I hadn't thought of the calculations," said Phineas.

"The fact is, Finn," said Bonteen, "you are made of clay too fine for office. I've always found it has been so with men from your country.

You are the grandest horses in the world to look at out on a prairie, but you don't like the slavery of harness."

"And the sound of a whip over our shoulders sets us kicking;--does it not, Ratler?"

"I shall show the list to Gresham to-morrow," said Ratler, "and of course he can do as he pleases; but I don't understand this kind of thing."

"Don't you be in a hurry," said Bonteen. "I'll bet you a sovereign Finn votes with us yet. There's nothing like being a little coy to set off a girl's charms. I'll bet you a sovereign, Ratler, that Finn goes out into the lobby with you and me against Monk's bill."

Phineas, not being able to stand any more of this most unpleasant raillery, got up and went away. The club was distasteful to him, and he walked off and sauntered for a while about the park. He went down by the Duke of York's column as though he were going to his office, which of course was closed at this hour, but turned round when he got beyond the new public buildings,--buildings which he was never destined to use in their completed state,--and entered the gates of the enclosure, and wandered on over the bridge across the water. As he went his mind was full of thought. Could it be good for him to give up everything for a fair face? He swore to himself that of all women whom he had ever seen Mary was the sweetest and the dearest and the best. If it could be well to lose the world for a woman, it would be well to lose it for her. Violet, with all her skill, and all her strength, and all her grace, could never have written such a letter as that which he still held in his pocket. The best charm of a woman is that she should be soft, and trusting, and generous; and who ever had been more soft, more trusting, and more generous than his Mary?

Of course he would be true to her, though he did lose the world.

But to yield such a triumph to the Ratlers and Bonteens whom he left behind him,--to let them have their will over him,--to know that they would rejoice scurrilously behind his back over his downfall! The feeling was terrible to him. The last words which Bonteen had spoken made it impossible to him now not to support his old friend Mr. Monk.

It was not only what Bonteen had said, but that the words of Mr.

Bonteen so plainly indicated what would be the words of all the other Bonteens. He knew that he was weak in this. He knew that had he been strong, he would have allowed himself to be guided,--if not by the firm decision of his own spirit,--by the counsels of such men as Mr.

Gresham and Lord Cantrip, and not by the sarcasms of the Bonteens and Ratlers of official life. But men who sojourn amidst savagery fear the mosquito more than they do the lion. He could not bear to think that he should yield his blood to such a one as Bonteen.

And he must yield his blood, unless he could vote for Mr. Monk's motion, and hold his ground afterwards among them all in the House of Commons. He would at any rate see the session out, and try a fall with Mr. Bonteen when they should be sitting on different benches,--if ever fortune should give him an opportunity. And in the meantime, what should he do about Madame Goesler? What a fate was his to have the handsomest woman in London with thousands and thousands a year at his disposal! For,--so he now swore to himself,--Madame Goesler was the handsomest woman in London, as Mary Flood Jones was the sweetest girl in the world.

He had not arrived at any decision so fixed as to make him comfortable when he went home and dressed for Mrs. Gresham's party.

And yet he knew,--he thought that he knew that he would be true to Mary Flood Jones.