In that hour of conversation, which they had had together, Lady Chiltern had said not a word to Phineas of her aunt, and now he felt himself to be almost discomposed by the meeting.

"Is your daughter here, Lady Baldock ?" Lady Baldock shook her head solemnly and sadly.

"Do not speak of her, Mr.Finn.It is too sad! We never mention her name now." Phineas looked as sad as he knew how to look, but he said nothing.

The lamentation of the mother did not seem to imply that the daughter was dead; and, from his remembrance of Augusta Boreham, he would have thought her to be the last woman in the world to run away with the coachman.

At the moment there did not seem to be any other sufficient cause for so melancholy a wagging of that venerable head.