now that he has
nothing of his own to offer her for the future but his bare title,
now that he has given papa power to do what he will with the
property, I believe that she would accept him instantly. That is her
disposition."

Phineas again paused a moment before he replied. "Let him try," he
said.

"He is away,--in Brussels."

"Send to him, and bid him return. I will be patient, Lady Laura. Let
him come and try, and I will bide my time. I confess that I have no
right to interfere with him if there be a chance for him. If there is
no chance, my right is as good as that of any other."

There was something in this which made Lady Laura feel that she
could not maintain her hostility against this man on behalf of her
brother;--and yet she could not force herself to be other than
hostile to him. Her heart was sore, and it was he that had made
it sore. She had lectured herself, schooling herself with mental
sackcloth and ashes, rebuking herself with heaviest censures from day
to day, because she had found herself to be in danger of regarding
this man with a perilous love; and she had been constant in this
work of penance till she had been able to assure herself that the
sackcloth and ashes had done their work, and that the danger was
past. "I like him still and love him well," she had said to herself
with something almost of triumph, "but I have ceased to think of him
as one who might have been my lover." And yet she was now sick and
sore, almost beside herself with the agony of the wound, because this
man whom she had been able to throw aside from her heart had also
been able so to throw her aside. And she felt herself constrained to
rebuke him with what bitterest words she might use. She had felt it
easy to do this at first, on her brother's score. She had accused him
of treachery to his friendship,--both as to Oswald and as to herself.
On that she could say cutting words without subjecting herself to
suspicion even from herself. But now this power was taken away from
her, and still she wished to wound him. She desired to taunt him
with his old fickleness, and yet to subject herself to no imputation.
"Your right!" she said. "What gives you any right in the matter?"

"Simply the right of a fair field, and no favour."

"And yet you come to me for favour,--to me, because I am her friend.
You cannot win her yourself, and think I may help you! I do not
believe in your love for her. There! If there were no other reason,