"Papa thinks so much about the borough." The reader will remember that both Lord Brentford and his daughter were thorough reformers!

The use of a little borough of his own, however, is a convenience to a great peer.

"Those difficult things have always to be talked of for a long while, and then they become easy," said Violet. "I believe if you were to propose to Mr. Kennedy to give all his property to the Church Missionaries and emigrate to New Zealand, he'd begin to consider it seriously after a time."

"I shall not try, at any rate."

"Because you don't want to go to New Zealand;--but you might try about Loughton for poor Mr. Finn."

"Violet," said Lady Laura, after a moment's pause;--and she spoke sharply; "Violet, I believe you are in love with Mr. Finn."

"That's just like you, Laura."

"I never made such an accusation against you before, or against anybody else that I can remember. But I do begin to believe that you are in love with Mr. Finn."

"Why shouldn't I be in love with him, if I like?"

"I say nothing about that;--only he has not got a penny."

"But I have, my dear."

"And I doubt whether you have any reason for supposing that he is in love with you."

"That would be my affair, my dear."

"Then you are in love with him?"

"That is my affair also."

Lady Laura shrugged her shoulders. "Of course it is; and if you tell me to hold my tongue, of course I will do so. If you ask me whether I think it a good match, of course I must say I do not."

"I don't tell you to hold your tongue, and I don't ask you what you think about the match. You are quite welcome to talk as much about me as you please;--but as to Mr. Phineas Finn, you have no business to think anything."

"I shouldn't talk to anybody but yourself."

"I am growing to be quite indifferent as to what people say. Lady Baldock asked me the other day whether I was going to throw myself away on Mr. Laurence Fitzgibbon."

"No!"

"Indeed she did."

"And what did you answer?"

"I told her that it was not quite settled; but that as I had only spoken to him once during the last two years, and then for not more than half a minute, and as I wasn't sure whether I knew him by sight, and as I had reason to suppose he didn't know my name, there might, perhaps, be a delay of a week or two before the thing came off. Then she flounced out of the room."

"But what made her ask about Mr. Fitzgibbon?"

"Somebody had been hoaxing her. I am beginning to think that Augusta does it for her private amus.e.m.e.nt. If so, I shall think more highly of my dear cousin than I have hitherto done. But, Laura, as you have made a similar accusation against me, and as I cannot get out of it with you as I do with my aunt, I must ask you to hear my protestation. I am not in love with Mr. Phineas Finn. Heaven help me;--as far as I can tell, I am not in love with any one, and never shall be." Lady Laura looked pleased. "Do you know," continued Violet, "that I think I could be in love with Mr. Phineas Finn, if I could be in love with anybody?" Then Lady Laura looked displeased.

"In the first place, he is a gentleman," continued Violet. "Then he is a man of spirit. And then he has not too much spirit;--not that kind of spirit which makes some men think that they are the finest things going. His manners are perfect;--not Chesterfieldian, and yet never offensive. He never browbeats any one, and never toadies any one. He knows how to live easily with men of all ranks, without any appearance of claiming a special status for himself. If he were made Archbishop of Canterbury to-morrow, I believe he would settle down into the place of the first subject in the land without arrogance, and without false shame."

"You are his eulogist with a vengeance."

"I am his eulogist; but I am not in love with him. If he were to ask me to be his wife to-morrow, I should be distressed, and should refuse him. If he were to marry my dearest friend in the world, I should tell him to kiss me and be my brother. As to Mr. Phineas Finn,--those are my sentiments."

"What you say is very odd."

"Why odd?"

"Simply because mine are the same."

"Are they the same? I once thought, Laura, that you did love him;--that you meant to be his wife."

Lady Laura sat for a while without making any reply to this. She sat with her elbow on the table and with her face leaning on her hand,--thinking how far it would tend to her comfort if she spoke in true confidence. Violet during the time never took her eyes from her friend's face, but remained silent as though waiting for an answer.

She had been very explicit as to her feelings. Would Laura Kennedy be equally explicit? She was too clever to forget that such plainness of speech would be, must be more difficult to Lady Laura than to herself. Lady Laura was a married woman; but she felt that her friend would have been wrong to search for secrets, unless she were ready to tell her own. It was probably some such feeling which made Lady Laura speak at last.

"So I did, nearly--" said Lady Laura; "very nearly. You told me just now that you had money, and could therefore do as you pleased. I had no money, and could not do as I pleased."

"And you told me also that I had no reason for thinking that he cared for me."

"Did I? Well;--I suppose you have no reason. He did care for me. He did love me."

"He told you so?"

"Yes;--he told me so."

"And how did you answer him?"

"I had that very morning become engaged to Mr. Kennedy. That was my answer."

"And what did he say when you told him?"

"I do not know. I cannot remember. But he behaved very well."

"And now,--if he were to love me, you would grudge me his love?"

"Not for that reason,--not if I know myself. Oh no! I would not be so selfish as that."

"For what reason then?"

"Because I look upon it as written in heaven that you are to be Oswald's wife."

"Heaven's writings then are false," said Violet, getting up and walking away.

In the meantime Phineas was very wretched at home. When he reached his lodgings after leaving the House,--after his short conversation with Mr. Monk,--he tried to comfort himself with what that gentleman had said to him. For a while, while he was walking, there had been some comfort in Mr. Monk's words. Mr. Monk had much experience, and doubtless knew what he was saying,--and there might yet be hope. But all this hope faded away when Phineas was in his own rooms. There came upon him, as he looked round them, an idea that he had no business to be in Parliament, that he was an impostor, that he was going about the world under false pretences, and that he would never set himself aright, even unto himself, till he had gone through some terrible act of humiliation. He had been a cheat even to Mr. Quintus Slide of the _Banner_, in accepting an invitation to come among them. He had been a cheat to Lady Laura, in that he had induced her to think that he was fit to live with her. He was a cheat to Violet Effingham, in a.s.suming that he was capable of making himself agreeable to her. He was a cheat to Lord Chiltern when riding his horses, and pretending to be a proper a.s.sociate for a man of fortune.

Why,--what was his income? What his birth? What his proper position?

And now he had got the reward which all cheats deserve. Then he went to bed, and as he lay there, he thought of Mary Flood Jones. Had he plighted his troth to Mary, and then worked like a slave under Mr.

Low's auspices,--he would not have been a cheat.

It seemed to him that he had hardly been asleep when the girl came into his room in the morning. "Sir," said she, "there's that gentleman there."