ou would prove her
guilty of no indelicacy, no treachery, no underhand conduct, though
appearances might be against her."

"_Might_ be! You select your words strangely; you must have some deeper
motive for your unusual blindness. I desire, for the last time, that you
cease either the subject to me, or your acquaintance with me, whichever
you prefer."

With which, he went up the steps of White's, and I strolled on, amazed
at the fierce acrimony of his tone, utterly unlike anything I had ever
heard from him, wished their pride to the devil, called myself a fool
for meddling in the matter at all, and went to have a quiet weed in the
smoking-room of the U. S. to cool myself. I was heartily sick of the
whole affair. If they wanted it cleared, they must clear it
themselves--I should trouble myself no more about it. Yet I couldn't
altogether dismiss Beatrice's cause from my mind. I thought her, to say
the truth, rather harshly used. I liked her for her fearless, truthful,
impassioned character. I liked her for the very courage and pride with
which she preferred to relinquish any chance of regaining her forfeited
happiness, rather than stoop to solicit exculpation from charges of
which she knew she was innocent. Perhaps, at first, she did not consider
sufficiently Earlscourt's provocation, and perhaps, now, she was too
persisting in her resentment of it; still I liked her, and I was sorry
to see her, at an age when life should have been couleur de rose, to one
of her gay and insouciant nature, with a weary, passionate look on her
face that she should not have had for ten years to come--a look that was
rapidly hardening into stern and contemptuous sadness.

"You tell me I am too bitter," she said to me one day, "how should I be
otherwise? I, who have wronged no one, and have never in my life done
anything of which I am ashamed, am called an intrigante by Lady Clive
Edghill, and get ill-will from strangers, and misconstructions from my
friends, merely because, thinking no harm myself, it never occurs to me
that circumstances may look against me; and, hating falsehood, I cannot
lie, and smile, and give soft words where I feel contempt and
indignation. Mrs. Breloques yonder, with whom les presens ont toujours
raison, and les absens ont toujours tort, who has honeyed speeches for
her bitterest foes, and poisoned arrows (behind their back) for her most
trusting friends, who goes to early matins every morning, and pries out
for a s