"No;—nor heard from him. When last I heard of him he was in Brussels."
"Ah,—yes; he is somewhere on the Rhine now. I thought that as you were so intimate, perhaps you corresponded with him. Have you heard that we have arranged about Lady Laura's money?"
"I have heard. Lady Laura has told me."
"I wish he would return," said Lord Brentford sadly,—almost solemnly. "As that great difficulty is over, I would receive him willingly, and make my house pleasant to him, if I can do so. I am most anxious that he should settle, and marry. Could you not write to him?" Phineas, not daring to tell Lord Brentford that he had quarrelled with Lord Chiltern,—feeling that if he did so everything would go wrong,—said that he would write to Lord Chiltern.
As he went away he felt that he was bound to get an answer from Violet Effingham. If it should be necessary, he was willing to break with Lord Brentford on that matter,—even though such breaking should lose him his borough and his place;—but not on any other matter.
CHAPTER XLIV
Phineas and His Friends
Our hero's friends were, I think, almost more elated by our hero's promotion than was our hero himself. He never told himself that it was a great thing to be a junior lord of the Treasury, though he acknowledged to himself that to have made a successful beginning was a very great thing. But his friends were loud in their congratulations,—or condolements as the case might be.
He had his interview with Mr. Mildmay, and, after that, one of his first steps was to inform Mrs. Bunce that he must change his lodgings. "The truth is, Mrs. Bunce, not that I want anything better; but that a better position will be advantageous to me, and that I can afford to pay for it." Mrs. Bunce acknowledged the truth of the argument, with her apron up to her eyes. "I've got to be so fond of looking after you, Mr. Finn! I have indeed," said Mrs. Bunce. "It is not just what you pays like, because another party will pay as much. But we've got so used to you, Mr. Finn,—haven't we?" Mrs. Bunce was probably not aware herself that the comeliness of her lodger had pleased her feminine eye, and touched her feminine heart. Had anybody said that Mrs. Bunce was in love with Phineas, the scandal would have been monstrous. And yet it was so,—after a fashion. And Bunce knew it,—after his fashion. "Don't be such an old fool," he said, "crying after him because he's six foot high." "I ain't crying after him because he's six foot high," whined the poor woman;—"but one does like old faces better than new, and a gentleman about one's place is pleasant." "Gentleman be d––––d," said Bunce. But his anger was excited, not by his wife's love for Phineas, but by the use of an objectionable word.