"And you?"
Phineas smiled, and tried to smile pleasantly, as he answered, "I don't know that they'll put themselves out by doing very much for me."
"They'll do something."
"I fancy not. Indeed, Lady Laura, to tell the truth at once, I know that they don't mean to offer me anything."
"After making you give up your place in Ireland?"
"They didn't make me give it up. I should never dream of using such an argument to any one. Of course I had to judge for myself. There is nothing to be said about it;—only it is so." As he told her this he strove to look light-hearted, and so to speak that she should not see the depth of his disappointment;—but he failed altogether. She knew him too well not to read his whole heart in the matter.
"Who has said it?" she asked.
"Nobody says things of that kind, and yet one knows."
"And why is it?"
"How can I say? There are various reasons,—and, perhaps, very good reasons. What I did before makes men think that they can't depend on me. At any rate it is so."