ss Melmotte, and her brother had felt that
it would be best that he should acknowledge that it must be all over.
'I wonder whether that is true,' said Melmotte, looking at her out of
his great coarse eyes, with his eyebrows knit, with his hat on his
head and his hands in his pockets. Hetta, not knowing how, at the
moment, to repudiate the suspicion expressed, was silent. 'Because,
you know, there has been a deal of falsehood and double dealing. Sir
Felix has behaved infamously; yes,--by G----, infamously. A day or two
before my daughter started, he gave me a written assurance that the
whole thing was over, and now he sends you here. How am I to know what
you are really after?'

'I have come because I thought I could do some good,' she said,
trembling with anger and fear. 'I was speaking to your daughter at
your party.'

'Oh, you were there;--were you? It may be as you say, but how is
one to tell? When one has been deceived like that, one is apt to be
suspicious, Miss Carbury.' Here was one who had spent his life in lying
to the world, and who was in his very heart shocked at the atrocity of
a man who had lied to him! 'You are not plotting another journey to
Liverpool;--are you?' To this Hetta could make no answer. The insult
was too much, but alone, unsupported, she did not know how to give him
back scorn for scorn. At last he proposed to take her across to Bruton
Street himself and at his bidding she walked by his side. 'May I hear
what you say to her?' he asked.

'If you suspect me, Mr Melmotte, I had better not see her at all. It
is only that there may no longer be any doubt.'

'You can say it all before me.'

'No;--I could not do that. But I have told you, and you can say it
for me. If you please, I think I will go home now.'

But Melmotte knew that his daughter would not believe him on such a
subject. This girl she probably would believe. And though Melmotte
himself found it difficult to trust anybody, he thought that there was
more possible good than evil to be expected from the proposed
interview. 'Oh, you shall see her,' he said. 'I don't suppose she's
such a fool as to try that kind of thing again.' Then the door in
Bruton Street was opened, and Hetta, repenting her mission, found
herself almost pushed into the hall. She was bidden to follow Melmotte
upstairs, and was left alone in the drawing-room, as she thought, for
a long time. Then the door was slowly opened and Marie crept into the
room. 'Miss Car