never know. We are all older, of course. Twenty years does not go by
without leaving its marks, as I can feel myself."

"Men do not grow old as women do, who live alone and gather rust as
they feed on their own thoughts."

"I know no one whom time has touched so lightly as yourself, Lady
Mason; but if I may speak to you as a friend--"

"If you may not, Mr. Furnival, who may?"

"I should tell you that you are weak to be so despondent, or rather
so unhappy."

"Another lawsuit would kill me, I think. You say that I was brave and
constant before, but you cannot understand what I suffered. I nerved
myself to bear it, telling myself that it was the first duty that I
owed to the babe that was lying on my bosom. And when standing there
in the Court, with that terrible array around me, with the eyes of
all men on me, the eyes of men who thought that I had been guilty of
so terrible a crime, for the sake of that child who was so weak I
could be brave. But it nearly killed me. Mr. Furnival, I could not
go through that again; no, not even for his sake. If you can save me
from that, even though it be by the buying off of that ungrateful
man--"

"You must not think of that."

"Must I not? ah me!"

"Will you tell Lucius all this, and let him come to me?"

"No; not for worlds. He would defy every one, and glory in the fight;
but after all it is I that must bear the brunt. No; he shall not know
it;--unless it becomes so public that he must know it."

And then, with some further pressing of the hand, and further words
of encouragement which were partly tender as from the man, and partly
forensic as from the lawyer, Mr. Furnival permitted her to go,
and she found her son at the chemist's shop in Holborn as she had
appointed. There were no traces of tears or of sorrow in her face as
she smiled on Lucius while giving him her hand, and then when they
were in a cab together she asked him as to his success at Liverpool.

"I am very glad that I went," said he, "very glad indeed. I saw the
merchants there who are the real importers of the article, and I have
made arrangements with them."

"Will it be cheaper so, Lucius?"

"Cheaper! not what women generally call cheaper. If there be anything
on earth that I hate, it is a bargain. A man who looks for bargains
must be a dupe or a cheat, and is probably both."

"Both, Lucius. Then he is doubly unfortunate."

"He is a cheat because he wants things for less than their value; and
a