eronda, with strong emphasis; "otherwise, it will be a lasting pain."

"No--no--it shall not be. It may be--it shall be better with me because
I have known you." She turned immediately, and quitted the room.

When she was on the first landing of the staircase, Sir Hugo passed
across the hall on his way to the library, and saw her. Grandcourt was
not with him.

Deronda, when the baronet entered, was standing in his ordinary
attitude, grasping his coat-collar, with his back to the table, and
with that indefinable expression by which we judge that a man is still
in the shadow of a scene which he has just gone through. He moved,
however, and began to arrange the letters.

"Has Mrs. Grandcourt been in here?" said Sir Hugo.

"Yes, she has."

"Where are the others?"

"I believe she left them somewhere in the grounds."

After a moment's silence, in which Sir Hugo looked at a letter without
reading it, he said "I hope you are not playing with fire, Dan--you
understand me?"

"I believe I do, sir," said Deronda, after a slight hesitation, which
had some repressed anger in it. "But there is nothing answering to your
metaphor--no fire, and therefore no chance of scorching."

Sir Hugo looked searchingly at him, and then said, "So much the better.
For, between ourselves, I fancy there may be some hidden gunpowder in
that establishment."

CHAPTER XXXVII.

_Aspern._ Pardon, my lord--I speak for Sigismund.
_Fronsberg._ For him? Oh, ay--for him I always hold
A pardon safe in bank, sure he will draw
Sooner or later on me. What his need?
Mad project broken? fine mechanic wings
That would not fly? durance, assault on watch,
Bill for Epernay, not a crust to eat?
_Aspern._ Oh, none of these, my lord; he has escaped
From Circe's herd, and seeks to win the love
Of your fair ward Cecilia: but would win
First your consent. You frown.
_Fronsberg._ Distinguish words.
I said I held a pardon, not consent.

In spite of Deronda's reasons for wishing to be in town again--reasons
in which his anxiety for Mirah was blent with curiosity to know more of
the enigmatic Mordecai--he did not manage to go up before Sir Hugo, who
preceded his family that he might be ready for the opening of
Parliament on the sixth of February. Deronda took up his quarters in
Park Lane