ncora, I have
learned to love you so dearly!"

"Then you are the only being that does. He can't love me. How is it
possible? You,--and perhaps another."

"There are many who love you. He loves you. Mr Palliser loves you."

"It is impossible. I have never said a word to him that could make
him love me. I have never done a thing for him that can make him love
me. The mother of his child he might have loved, because of that. Why
should he love me? We were told to marry each other and did it. When
could he have learned to love me? But, Alice, he requires no loving,
either to take it or to give it. I wish it were so with me."

Alice said what she could to comfort her, but her words were but of
little avail as regarded those marriage sorrows.

"Forgive you!" at last Glencora said. "What have I to forgive? You
don't suppose I do not know it all, and think of it all without the
chance of some stray word like that! Forgive you! I am so grateful
that you love me! Some one's love I must have found,--or I could not
have remained here."

CHAPTER XXVI

Lady Midlothian

A week or ten days after this, Alice, when she came down to the
breakfast-parlour one morning, found herself alone with Mr Bott. It
was the fashion at Matching Priory for people to assemble rather late
in the day. The nominal hour for breakfast was ten, and none of the
ladies of the party were ever seen before that. Some of the gentlemen
would breakfast earlier, especially on hunting mornings; and on some
occasions the ladies, when they came together, would find themselves
altogether deserted by their husbands and brothers. On this day it
was fated that Mr Bott alone should represent the sterner sex, and
when Alice entered the room he was standing on the rug with his back
to the fire, waiting till the appearance of some other guest should
give him the sanction necessary for the commencement of his morning
meal. Alice, when she saw him, would have retreated had it been
possible, for she had learned to dislike him greatly, and was,
indeed, almost afraid of him; but she could not do so without making
her flight too conspicuous.

"Do you intend to prolong your stay here, Miss Vavasor?" said Mr
Bott, taking advantage of the first moment at which she looked up
from a letter which she was reading.

"For a few more days, I think," said Alice.

"Ah--I'm glad of that. Mr Palliser has pressed me so much to remain
till he goes to the Duke's, that I cannot ge