uld not have lived with him.
I had no idea, before, that the nature of two human beings could be
so unlike. I so often remember what you told me of him,--here; in
this house, when I first brought you together. Alas, how sad it has
been!"

"Sad, indeed."

"But can this be true that you tell me of yourself?

"It is quite true. I could not say so before your father, but it is
Mr. Bonteen's doing. There is no remedy. I am sure of that. I am only
afraid that people are interfering for me in a manner that will be as
disagreeable to me as it will be useless."

"What friends?" she asked.

He was still standing with his arm round her waist, and he did not
like to mention the name of Madame Goesler.

"The Duchess of Omnium,--whom you remember as Lady Glencora
Palliser."

"Is she a friend of yours?"

"No;--not particularly. But she is an indiscreet woman, and hates
Bonteen, and has taken it into her stupid head to interest herself in
my concerns. It is no doing of mine, and yet I cannot help it."

"She will succeed."

"I don't want assistance from such a quarter; and I feel sure that
she will not succeed."

"What will you do, Phineas?"

"What shall I do? Carry on the battle as long as I can without
getting into debt, and then--vanish."

"You vanished once before,--did you not,--with a wife?"

"And now I shall vanish alone. My poor little wife! It seems all like
a dream. She was so good, so pure, so pretty, so loving!"

"Loving! A man's love is so easily transferred;--as easily as a
woman's hand;--is it not, Phineas? Say the word, for it is what you
are thinking."

"I was thinking of no such thing."

"You must think it--You need not be afraid to reproach me. I could
bear it from you. What could I not bear from you? Oh, Phineas;--if I
had only known myself then, as I do now!"

"It is too late for regrets," he said. There was something in the
words which grated on her feelings, and induced her at length to
withdraw herself from his arm. Too late for regrets! She had never
told herself that it was not too late. She was the wife of another
man, and therefore, surely it was too late. But still the word coming
from his mouth was painful to her. It seemed to signify that for him
at least the game was all over.

"Yes, indeed," she said,--"if our regrets and remorse were at our own
disposal! You might as well say that it is too late for unhappiness,
too late for weariness, too late for all the misery that comes fr