'You have so many friends.'
Lord Cadurcis smiled. 'I wish,' he said, after a little hesitation, 'if only for "Auld lang syne," I might include Lady Annabel Herbert among them.'
'I do not think there is any basis for friendship between us, my lord,' she said, very dryly.
'The past must ever be with me,' said Lord Cadurcis, 'and I should have thought a sure and solid one.'
'Our opinions on all subjects are so adverse, that I must believe that there could be no great sympathy in our feelings.'
'My feelings are beyond my control,' he replied; 'they are, and must ever be, totally independent of my opinions.'
Lady Annabel did not reply. His lordship felt baffled, but he was resolved to make one more effort.
'Do you know,' he said, 'I can scarcely believe myself in London to-day? To be sitting next to you, to see Miss Herbert, to hear Dr. Masham's voice. Oh! does it not recall Cherbury, or Marringhurst, or that day at Cadurcis, when you were so good as to smile over my rough repast? Ah! Lady Annabel, those days were happy! those were feelings that can never die! All the glitter and hubbub of the world can never make me forget them, can never make you, I hope, Lady Annabel, quite recall them with an effort. We were friends then: let us be friends now.'
'I am too old to cultivate new friendships,' said Lady Annabel; 'and if we are to be friends, Lord Cadurcis, I am sorry to say that, after the interval that has occurred since we last parted, we should have to begin again.'
'It is a long time,' said Cadurcis, mournfully, 'a very long time, and one, in spite of what the world may think, to which I cannot look back with any self-congratulation. I wished three years ago never to leave Cadurcis again. Indeed I did; and indeed it was not my fault that I quitted it.'