to him. As to telling his aunt that he
had changed his mind, and, therefore, refunding the money--no such
thought as that was possible to him! To give back two hundred pounds
entire,--two hundred pounds which were already within his clutches,
was not within the compass of Burgo's generosity. Remembering the
cash, he told himself that hesitation was no longer possible to
him. So he gathered himself up, stretched his hands over his head,
uttered a sigh that was audible to all around him, and took himself
up-stairs.

He looked in at his aunt's room, and then he saw her and was seen by
her. "Well, Burgo," she said, with her sweetest smile, "have you been
dancing?" He turned away from her without answering her, muttering
something between his teeth about a cold-blooded Jezebel,--which, if
she had heard it, would have made her think him the most ungrateful
of men. But she did not hear him, and smiled still as he went away,
saying something to Mrs Conway Sparkes as to the great change for the
better which had taken place in her nephew's conduct.

"There's no knowing who may not reform," said Mrs Sparkes, with an
emphasis which seemed to Lady Monk to be almost uncourteous.

Burgo made his way first into the front room and then into the
larger room where the dancing was in progress, and there he saw Lady
Glencora standing up in a quadrille with the Marquis of Hartletop.
Lord Hartletop was a man not much more given to conversation than
his wife, and Lady Glencora seemed to go through her work with very
little gratification either in the dancing or in the society of her
partner. She was simply standing up to dance, because, as she had
told Mr Palliser, ladies of her age generally do stand up on such
occasions. Burgo watched her as she crossed and re-crossed the room,
and at last she was aware of his presence. It made no change in her,
except that she became even somewhat less animated than she had been
before. She would not seem to see him, nor would she allow herself to
be driven into a pretence of a conversation with her partner because
he was there. "I will go up to her at once, and ask her to waltz,"
Burgo said to himself, as soon as the last figure of the quadrille
was in action. "Why should I not ask her as well as any other woman?"
Then the music ceased, and after a minute's interval Lord Hartletop
took away his partner on his arm into another room. Burgo, who had
been standing near the door, followed them at once. The