ved morning and
night,--so that we might have succeeded. I hate being beat. I'd
sooner be cut in pieces."

"There is no help for it now, Cora. The Lord Mayor, you know, is only
Lord Mayor for one year, and must then go back to private life."

"But men have been Prime Ministers for ten years at a time. If you
have made up your mind, I suppose we may as well give up. I shall
always think it your own fault." He still smiled. "I shall," she
said.

"Oh, Cora!"

"I can only speak as I feel."

"I don't think you would speak as you do, if you knew how much your
words hurt me. In such a matter as this I should not be justified in
allowing your opinions to have weight with me. But your sympathy
would be so much to me!"

"When I thought it was making you ill, I wished that you might be
spared."

"My illness would be nothing, but my honour is everything. I, too,
have something to bear as well as you, and if you cannot approve of
what I do, at any rate be silent."

"Yes;--I can be silent." Then he slowly left her. As he went she was
almost tempted to yield, and to throw herself into his arms, and to
promise that she would be soft to him, and to say that she was sure
that all he did was for the best. But she could not bring herself as
yet to be good-humoured. If he had only been a little stronger, a
little thicker-skinned, made of clay a little coarser, a little other
than he was, it might all have been so different!

Early on that Sunday afternoon she had herself driven to Mrs. Finn's
house in Park Lane, instead of waiting for her friend. Latterly she
had but seldom done this, finding that her presence at home was much
wanted. She had been filled with, perhaps, foolish ideas of the
necessity of doing something,--of adding something to the strength of
her husband's position,--and had certainly been diligent in her work.
But now she might run about like any other woman. "This is an honour,
Duchess," said Mrs. Finn.

"Don't be sarcastic, Marie. We have nothing further to do with the
bestowal of honours. Why didn't he make everybody a peer or a baronet
while he was about it? Lord Finn! I don't see why he shouldn't have
been Lord Finn. I'm sure he deserved it for the way in which he
attacked Sir Timothy Beeswax."

"I don't think he'd like it."

"They all say so, but I suppose they do like it, or they wouldn't
take it. And I'd have made Locock a knight;--Sir James Locock. He'd
make a more knightly knight than Sir Timothy