and
now he is going to have penal servitude for the rest of his life. I
wonder who will be the better of it all. Who'll have the diamonds at
last?"

"I do not in the least care. I hate the diamonds. Of course I would
not give them up, because they were my own."

"The end of it seems to be that you have lost your property, and
sworn ever so many false oaths, and have brought all your friends
into trouble, and have got nothing by it. What was the good of being
so clever?"

"You need not come here to tease me, Lord George."

"I came here because you sent for me. There's my poor friend, Mrs.
Carbuncle, declares that all her credit is destroyed, and her niece
unable to marry, and her house taken away from her,--all because of
her connexion with you."

"Mrs. Carbuncle is--is--is-- Oh, Lord George, don't you know what she
is?"

"I know that Mrs. Carbuncle is in a very bad way, and that that girl
has gone crazy, and that poor Griff has taken himself off to Japan,
and that I am so knocked about that I don't know where to go; and
somehow it seems all to have come from your little manoeuvres. You
see, we have, all of us, been made remarkable; haven't we?"

"You are always remarkable, Lord George."

"And it is all your doing. To be sure you have lost your diamonds for
your pains. I wouldn't mind it so much if anybody were the better for
it. I shouldn't have begrudged even Benjamin the pull, if he'd got
it."

He stood there, still looking down upon her, speaking with a
sarcastic subrisive tone, and, as she felt, intending to be severe
to her. She had sent for him, and now she didn't know what to say to
him. Though she believed that she hated him, she would have liked to
get up some show of an affectionate farewell, some scene in which
there might have been tears, and tenderness, and poetry,--and,
perhaps, a parting caress. But with his jeering words, and sneering
face, he was as hard to her as a rock. He was now silent, but still
looking down upon her as he stood motionless upon the rug,--so that
she was compelled to speak again. "I sent for you, Lord George,
because I did not like the idea of parting with you for ever, without
one word of adieu."

"You are going to tear yourself away;--are you?"

"I am going to Portray on Monday."

"And never coming back any more? You'll be up here before the season
is over, with fifty more wonderful schemes in your little head. So
Lord Fawn is done with, is he?"

"I have told L