So he packed up his things, and started again for London in the beginning of February.  “Good-bye, Mary,” he said with his sweetest smile.  But on this occasion there was no kiss, and no culling of locks.  “I know he cannot help it,” said Mary to herself.  “It is his position.  But whether it be for good or evil, I will be true to him.”

“I am afraid you are unhappy,” Babara Finn said to her on the next morning.

“No; I am not unhappy,—­not at all.  I have a deal to make me happy and proud.  I don’t mean to be a bit unhappy.”  Then she turned away and cried heartily, and Barbara Finn cried with her for company.

CHAPTER XVII

Phineas Finn Returns to London

Phineas had received two letters during his recess at Killaloe from two women who admired him much, which, as they were both short, shall be submitted to the reader.  The first was as follows:—­

   Saulsby, October 20, 186—.

   My dear Mr. Finn,

I write a line to tell you that our marriage is to be hurried on as quickly as possible.  Mr. Kennedy does not like to be absent from Parliament; nor will he be content to postpone the ceremony till the session be over.  The day fixed is the 3rd of December, and we then go at once to Rome, and intend to be back in London by the opening of Parliament.

   Yours most sincerely,

   Laura Standish.

   Our London address will be No. 52, Grosvenor Place.

To this he wrote an answer as short, expressing his ardent wishes that those winter hymeneals might produce nothing but happiness, and saying that he would not be in town many days before he knocked at the door of No. 52, Grosvenor Place.

And the second letter was as follows:—­

   Great Marlborough Street, December, 186—.

   Dear and honoured sir,

Bunce is getting ever so anxious about the rooms, and says as how he has a young Equity draftsman and wife and baby as would take the whole house, and all because Miss Pouncefoot said a word about her port wine, which any lady of her age might say in her tantrums, and mean nothing after all.  Me and Miss Pouncefoot’s knowed each other for seven years, and what’s a word or two as isn’t meant after that?  But, honoured sir, it’s not about that as I write to trouble you, but to ask if I may say for certain that you’ll take the rooms again in February.  It’s easy to let them for the month after Christmas, because of the pantomimes.  Only say at once, because Bunce is nagging me day after day.  I don’t want nobody’s wife and baby to have to do for, and ’d sooner have a Parliament gent like yourself than any one else.

   Yours umbly and respectful,

   Jane Bunce.