nker, the weaver, what was he? I forgot," says
poor Jack, kicking on Clive's bed, "in that family the Newcomes don't
count. I beg your pardon," groans poor Jack.

They lapse into silence, during which Jack's cigar glimmers from the
twilight corner where Clive's bed is; whilst Clive wafts his fragrance
out of the window where he sits, and whence he has a view of Lady
Anne Newcome's windows to the right, over the bridge across the little
rushing river, at the Hotel de Hollande hard by. The lights twinkle in
the booths under the pretty lime avenues. The hum of distant voices is
heard; the gambling-palace is all in a blaze; it is an assembly night,
and from the doors of the conversation rooms, as they open and close,
escape gusts of harmony. Behind on the little hill the darkling woods
lie calm, the edges of the fir-trees cut sharp against the sky, which is
clear with a crescent moon and the lambent lights of the starry hosts of
heaven. Clive does not see pine-robed hills and shining stars, nor think
of pleasure in its palace yonder, nor of pain writhing on his own bed
within a few feet of him, where poor Belsize was groaning. His eyes are
fixed upon a window whence comes the red light of a lamp, across which
shadows float now and again. So every light in every booth yonder has
a scheme of its own: every star above shines by itself; and each
individual heart of ours goes on brightening with its own hopes, burning
with its own desires, and quivering with its own pain.

The reverie is interrupted by the waiter, who announces M. le Vicomte
de Florac, and a third cigar is added to the other two smoky lights.
Belsize is glad to see Florac, whom he has known in a thousand haunts.
"He will do my business for me. He has been out half a dozen times,"
thinks Jack. It would relieve the poor fellow's boiling blood that some
one would let a little out. He lays his affair before Florac; he expects
a message from Lord Dorking.

"Comment donc?" cries Florac; "il y avait donc quelque chose! Cette
pauvre petite Miss! Vous voulez tuer le pere, apres avoir delaisse la
fille? Cherchez d'autres temoins, Monsieur. Le Vicomte de Florac ne se
fait pas complice de telles lachetes."

"By Heaven," says Jack, sitting up on the bed, with his eyes glaring,
"I have a great mind, Florac, to wring your infernal little neck, and to
fling you out of the window. Is all the world going to turn against
me? I am half mad as it is. If any man dares to think any