‘And where are you going?’ She shook her head.  ’With whom will you live?’

‘With Miss Cass,—­two old maids together.  I know nothing further.’

‘But about money?  That is if I am justified in asking.’

’What would you not be justified in asking?  Do you not know that I would tell you every secret of my own heart;—­if my heart had a secret?  It seems that I have given up what was to have been my fortune.  There was a claim of twelve thousand pounds on Grex.  But I have abandoned it.’

‘And there is nothing?’

’There will be scrapings they tell me,—­unless Percival refuses to agree.  This house is mortgaged, but not for its value.  And there are some jewels.  But all that is detestable,—­a mere grovelling among mean hundreds; whereas you,—­you will soar among—­’

‘Oh Mabel! do not say hard things to me.’

’No, indeed! why should I,—­I who have been preaching that comfortable doctrine of hypocrisy?  I will say nothing hard.  But I would sooner talk of your good things than my evil ones.’

‘I would not.’

’Then you must talk about them for my sake.  How was it that the Duke came round at last?’

‘I hardly know.  She sent for me.’

’A fine high-spirited girl.  These Pallisers have more courage about them than one expects from their outward manner.  Silverbridge has plenty of it.’

‘I remember telling you he could be obstinate.’

’And I remember that I did not believe you.  Now I know it.  He has that sort of pluck which enables a man to break a girl’s heart,—­or to destroy a girl’s hopes,—­without wincing.  He can tell a girl to her face that she can go to the—­mischief for him.  There are so many men who can’t do that, from cowardice, though their hearts be ever so well inclined.  “I have changed my mind.”  There is something great in the courage of a man who can say that to a woman in so many words.  Most of them, when they escape by lies and subterfuges.  Or they run away and won’t allow themselves to be heard of.  They trust to a chapter of accidents, and leave things to arrange themselves.  But when a man can look a girl in the face with those seemingly soft eyes, and say with that seemingly soft mouth,—­“I have changed my mind",—­though she would look him dead in return, if she could, still she must admire him.’  ‘Are you speaking of Silverbridge now?’

’Of course I am speaking of Silverbridge.  I suppose I ought to hide it all and not tell you.  But as you are the only person I do tell, you must put up with me.  Yes;—­when I taxed him with his falsehood,—­for he had been false,—­he answered me with those very words!  “I have changed my mind.”  He could not lie.  To speak the truth was a necessity to him, even at the expense of his gallantry, almost of his humanity.’

‘Has he been false to you, Mabel?’