“At any rate I will think and believe no ill of him.”

“Just so;—­do not believe evil of him,—­not more evil than you see.  I am so anxious,—­so very anxious to try to put him on his legs, and I find it so difficult to get any connecting link with him.  Papa will not speak with him,—­because of money.”

“But he is friends with you.”

“Yes; I think he loves me.  I saw how distasteful it was to you to go to him;—­and probably you were engaged?”

“One can always get off those sort of things if there is an object.”

“Yes;—­just so.  And the object was to oblige me;—­was it not?”

“Of course it was.  But I must go now.  We are to hear Daubeny’s statement at four, and I would not miss it for worlds.”

“I wonder whether you would go abroad with my brother in the autumn?  But I have no right to think of such a thing;—­have I?  At any rate I will not think of it yet.  Good-bye,—­I shall see you perhaps on Sunday if you are in town.”

Phineas walked down to Westminster with his mind very full of Lady Laura and Lord Chiltern.  What did she mean by her affectionate manner to himself, and what did she mean by the continual praises which she lavished upon Mr. Kennedy?  Of whom was she thinking most, of Mr. Kennedy, or of him?  She had called herself his mentor.  Was the description of her feelings towards himself, as conveyed in that name, of a kind to be gratifying to him?  No;—­he thought not.  But then might it not be within his power to change the nature of those feelings?  She was not in love with him at present.  He could not make any boast to himself on that head.  But it might be within his power to compel her to love him.  The female mentor might be softened.  That she could not love Mr. Kennedy, he thought that he was quite sure.  There was nothing like love in her manner to Mr. Kennedy.  As to Lord Chiltern, Phineas would do whatever might be in his power.  All that he really knew of Lord Chiltern was that he had gambled and that he had drunk.

CHAPTER IX

The New Government

In the House of Lords that night, and in the House of Commons, the outgoing Ministers made their explanations.  As our business at the present moment is with the Commons, we will confine ourselves to their chamber, and will do so the more willingly because the upshot of what was said in the two places was the same.  The outgoing ministers were very grave, very self-laudatory, and very courteous.  In regard to courtesy it may be declared that no stranger to the ways of the place could have understood how such soft words could be spoken by Mr. Daubeny, beaten, so quickly after the very sharp words which he had uttered when he only expected to be beaten.  He announced to his fellow-commoners that his right honourable friend and colleague Lord de Terrier had thought it right to retire from the Treasury.  Lord de Terrier, in constitutional