had befallen her,
when she offered her hand in vain? She must know by this time that he
intended to throw himself at her feet; and would hardly have advised
him as she had done as to the necessity of following up that success
which had hitherto been so essential to him, had she intended to
give him all that she had once offered him before. It might well be
that Lady Chiltern, and even the Duchess, should be mistaken. Marie
Goesler was not a woman, he thought, to reveal the deeper purposes of
her life to any such friend as the Duchess of Omnium.

Of his own feelings in regard to the offer which was about to be made
to him he had hardly succeeded in making her understand anything.
That a change had come upon himself was certain, but he did not
at all believe that it had sprung from any weakness caused by his
sufferings in regard to the murder. He rather believed that he
had become stronger than weaker from all that he had endured. He
had learned when he was younger,--some years back,--to regard
the political service of his country as a profession in which a
man possessed of certain gifts might earn his bread with more
gratification to himself than in any other. The work would be hard,
and the emolument only intermittent; but the service would in itself
be pleasant; and the rewards of that service,--should he be so
successful as to obtain reward,--would be dearer to him than
anything which could accrue to him from other labours. To sit in
the Cabinet for one Session would, he then thought, be more to him
than to preside over the Court of Queen's Bench as long as did Lord
Mansfield. But during the last few months a change had crept across
his dream,--which he recognized but could hardly analyse. He had seen
a man whom he despised promoted, and the place to which the man had
been exalted had at once become contemptible in his eyes. And there
had been quarrels and jangling, and the speaking of evil words
between men who should have been quiet and dignified. No doubt Madame
Goesler was right in attributing the revulsion in his hopes to Mr.
Bonteen and Mr. Bonteen's enmity; but Phineas Finn himself did not
know that it was so.

He arrived in town in the evening, and his appointment with Mr.
Gresham was for the following morning. He breakfasted at his club,
and there he received the following letter from Lady Laura Kennedy:--

Saulsby 28th August, 18--

MY DEAR PHINEAS,

I have just received a letter from Barri