“I see that you have gained a solicitor devoted to your interests; but I maintain that it would be directly against your interest to put pressure on the Colonel. I know him; I know that he would resist your claim with such influence to back him as even you could not stand against; and I know on the other hand”--George lowered his voice, and spoke with slow significance--“that if you are content to let things remain as they are, he will be quite ready to make _private_ redress by making such provision for you, when you choose to ask for it, as even the daughter of a princess would not refuse.” Chloris was interested to the extent of evidently occupying herself with a mental calculation. “_Ask_ for it! I could _claim_ it!” she said defiantly. “But as a claim it would not be allowed.” Chloris shrugged her shoulders, but she was impressed. She knew that her charms had passed their zenith, and a handsome provision for the future was not to be despised. George was satisfied with the impression he had made, and extremely anxious to be rid of her. In fact they both felt glad that the reappearance of the warder now brought to a close a visit which had been prompted by no very kindly feeling. At the last Chloris seemed to feel this, and she lingered at the door to say, in a voice that had some womanly kindliness and some self-reproach in it: “I am sorry I came, for I have done you no good. I was thinking of nothing but my child--my disappointment. Forgive me. I am not bad all through, and I thank you for what you have done for her. We can feel for each other now, you and I, different as we are: we have both lost her. If I have had any hand in bringing you here, forgive me, for my life is broken too.” George held out his hand. Not that he believed much in the permanency of the capricious creature’s grief, but that it was impossible for him to refuse pardon to any one who asked for it sincerely. She kissed his fingers passionately, to his great discomfiture; for not only had he a Briton’s natural objection to demonstrations of this sort, but his clemency towards the woman who had done her utmost to cause the wreck of his life was only the result of a surface sentiment of pity which thinly covered a very much deeper feeling of disgust and resentment, and when the door closed behind her he shook himself like a dog, with an impulse to get free from the very air which she had breathed.