As for Geoffrey, if Lady Honoria could have seen him she would have stared in astonishment.  Of late he had been a very silent man, many people indeed had found him a dull companion.  But under the influence of Beatrice’s presence he talked and talked brilliantly.  Perhaps he was unconsciously striving to show at his very best before her, as a man naturally does in the presence of a woman whom he loves.  So brilliantly did he talk that at last they all sat still and listened to him, and they might have been worse employed.

At length supper was done, and Elizabeth retired to her room.  Presently, too, Mr. Granger was called out to christen a sick baby and went grumbling, and they were left alone.  They sat in the window-place and looked out at the quiet night.

“Tell me about yourself,” said Beatrice.

So he told her.  He narrated all the steps by which he had reached his present position, and showed her how from it he might rise to the topmost heights of all.  She did not look at him, and did not answer him, but once when he paused, thinking that he had talked enough about himself, she said, “Go on; tell me some more.”

At last he had told her all.

“Yes,” she said, “you have the power and the opportunity, and you will one day be among the foremost men of your generation.”

“I doubt it,” he said with a sigh.  “I am not ambitious.  I only work for the sake of work, not for what it will bring.  One day I daresay that I shall weary of it all and leave it.  But while I do work, I like to be among the first in my degree.”

“Oh, no,” she answered, “you must not give it up; you must go on and on.  Promise me,” she continued, looking at him for the first time—­“promise me that while you have health and strength you will persevere till you stand alone and quite pre-eminent.  Then you can give it up.”

“Why should I promise you this, Beatrice?”

“Because I ask it of you.  Once I saved your life, Mr. Bingham, and it gives me some little right to direct its course.  I wish that the man whom I saved to the world should be among the first men in the world, not in wealth, which is an accident, but in intellect and force.  Promise me this and I shall be happy.”

“I promise you,” he said, “I promise that I will try to rise because you ask it, not because the prospect attracts me; but as he spoke his heart was wrung.  It was bitter to hear her speak thus of a future in which she would have no share, which, as her words implied, would be a thing utterly apart from her, as much apart as though she were dead.

“Yes,” he said again, “you gave me my life, and it makes me very unhappy to think that I can give you nothing in return.  Oh, Beatrice, I will tell you what I have never told to any one.  I am lonely and wretched.  With the exception of yourself, I do not think that there is anybody who really cares for—­I mean who really sympathises with me in the world.  I daresay that it is my own fault and it sounds a humiliating thing to say, and, in a fashion, a selfish thing.  I never should have said it to any living soul but you.  What is the use of being great when there is nobody to work for?  Things might have been different, but the world is a hard place.  If you—­if you——­”