xpanse of his past and present over which
Miriam had cast her shadow there was a very simple way to do so. He had
dodged this way, dishonestly fixing on another which, taken alone, was
far from being so good; but Lady Agnes brought him back to it. She held
him in well-nigh confused contemplation of it, during which the safety,
as Julia had called it, of the remedy wrought upon him as he wouldn't
have believed beforehand, and not least to the effect of sweetening, of
prettily colouring, the pill. It would be simple and it would deal with
all his problems; it would put an end to all alternatives, which, as
alternatives were otherwise putting an end to him, would be an excellent
thing. It would settle the whole question of his future, and it was high
time this should be settled.

Peter took two cups of coffee while he made out his future with Lady
Agnes, but though he drank them slowly he had finished them before Biddy
turned up. He stayed three-quarters of an hour, saying to himself she
wouldn't come--why should she come? Lady Agnes stooped to no avowal; she
really stooped, so far as bald words went, to no part of the business;
but she made him fix the next day save one for coming to dinner, and her
repeated declaration that there would be no one else, not another
creature but themselves, had almost the force of the supplied form for a
promise to pay. In giving his word that he would come without fail, and
not write the next day to throw them over for some function he should
choose to dub obligatory, he felt quite as if he were putting his name
to such a document. He went away at half-past three; Biddy of course
hadn't come, and he had been sure she wouldn't. He couldn't imagine what
Grace's idea had been, nor what pretext she had put forward to her
sister. Whatever these things Biddy had seen through them and hated
them. Peter could but like her the more for that.

XL

Lady Agnes would doubtless have done better, in her own interest or in
that of her child, to have secured his company for the very next
evening. This she had indeed attempted, but her application of her
thought had miscarried, Peter bethinking himself that he was importantly
engaged. Her ladyship, moreover, couldn't presume to answer for Nick,
since after all they must of course _have_ Nick, though, to tell the
truth, the hideous truth, she and her son were scarcely on terms. Peter
insisted on Nick, wished particularly to see him, and gave his ho