s to him. That she was not happy with her husband was very
clear to him;--but that was altogether another affair. She might be
unhappy with her husband without indulging any guilty love. He had
never thought it possible that she could be happy living with such a
husband as Mr. Kennedy. All that, however, was now past remedy, and
she must simply endure the mode of life which she had prepared for
herself. There were other men and women in London tied together for
better and worse, in reference to whose union their friends knew that
there would be no better;--that it must be all worse. Lady Laura must
bear it, as it was borne by many another married woman.

On the Monday morning Phineas called at Moroni's Hotel at ten
o'clock, but in spite of Lady Laura's assurance to the contrary, he
found that Lord Chiltern was out. He had felt some palpitation at the
heart as he made his inquiry, knowing well the fiery nature of the
man he expected to see. It might be that there would be some actual
personal conflict between him and this half-mad lord before he got
back again into the street. What Lady Laura had said about her
brother did not in the estimation of Phineas make this at all the
less probable. The half-mad lord was so singular in his ways that it
might well be that he should speak handsomely of a rival behind his
back and yet take him by the throat as soon as they were together,
face to face. And yet, as Phineas thought, it was necessary that he
should see the half-mad lord. He had written a letter to which he had
received no reply, and he considered it to be incumbent on him to
ask whether it had been received and whether any answer to it was
intended to be given. He went therefore to Lord Chiltern at once,--as
I have said, with some feeling at his heart that there might be
violence, at any rate of words, before he should find himself again
in the street. But Lord Chiltern was not there. All that the porter
knew was that Lord Chiltern intended to leave the house on the
following morning. Then Phineas wrote a note and left it with the
porter.

DEAR CHILTERN,

I particularly want to see you with reference to a letter
I wrote to you last summer. I must be in the House to-day
from four till the debate is over. I will be at the Reform
Club from two till half-past three, and will come if you
will send for me, or I will meet you anywhere at any hour
to-morrow morning.

Yours, always, P. F.

No