ssary, he was willing to break
with Lord Brentford on that matter,--even though such breaking should
lose him his borough and his place;--but not on any other matter.

CHAPTER XLIV

Phineas and His Friends

Our hero's friends were, I think, almost more elated by our hero's
promotion than was our hero himself. He never told himself that it
was a great thing to be a junior lord of the Treasury, though he
acknowledged to himself that to have made a successful beginning
was a very great thing. But his friends were loud in their
congratulations,--or condolements as the case might be.

He had his interview with Mr. Mildmay, and, after that, one of
his first steps was to inform Mrs. Bunce that he must change his
lodgings. "The truth is, Mrs. Bunce, not that I want anything better;
but that a better position will be advantageous to me, and that I
can afford to pay for it." Mrs. Bunce acknowledged the truth of the
argument, with her apron up to her eyes. "I've got to be so fond of
looking after you, Mr. Finn! I have indeed," said Mrs. Bunce. "It is
not just what you pays like, because another party will pay as much.
But we've got so used to you, Mr. Finn,--haven't we?" Mrs. Bunce was
probably not aware herself that the comeliness of her lodger had
pleased her feminine eye, and touched her feminine heart. Had anybody
said that Mrs. Bunce was in love with Phineas, the scandal would have
been monstrous. And yet it was so,--after a fashion. And Bunce knew
it,--after his fashion. "Don't be such an old fool," he said, "crying
after him because he's six foot high." "I ain't crying after him
because he's six foot high," whined the poor woman;--"but one does
like old faces better than new, and a gentleman about one's place
is pleasant." "Gentleman be d----d," said Bunce. But his anger was
excited, not by his wife's love for Phineas, but by the use of an
objectionable word.

Bunce himself had been on very friendly terms with Phineas, and they
two had had many discussions on matters of politics, Bunce taking
up the cudgels always for Mr. Turnbull, and generally slipping away
gradually into some account of his own martyrdom. For he had been a
martyr, having failed in obtaining any redress against the policeman
who had imprisoned him so wrongfully. The _People's Banner_
had fought for him manfully, and therefore there was a little
disagreement between him and Phineas on the subject of that great
organ of public opinion. And as