“How is that?” “I had a talk, a half-confidential talk, last night with Sewell on the subject, and he distinctly gave me to understand it could be negotiated through _him_.” “And you believed him?” “Yes, I believed him. It was the sort of tortuous, crooked transaction such a man might well move in. Had he told me of something very fine, very generous or self-devoting, he was about to do, I 'd have hesitated to accord him my trustfulness.” “What it is to be a lawyer!” said Balfour, with affected horror. “What it must be if a Secretary of State recoils from his perfidy! Oh, Mr. Balfour, for the short time our official connection may last let us play fair! I am not so coldblooded, nor are you as crafty, as you imagine. We are both of us better than we seem.” “Will you dine here to-day, Pem?” “Thanks, no; I am engaged.” “To-morrow, then?--I'll have Branley and Keppel to meet you.” “I always get out of town on Saturday night. Pray excuse me.” “No tempting you, eh?” “Not in that way, certainly. Good-bye till five o'clock.” CHAPTER XVI. A STARLIT NIGHT Late at night of the same day on which the conversation of last chapter occurred, Sewell was returning to the Priory: he was on foot, having failed to find a carriage at that late hour, and was depressed and wretched in mind, for he had lost a large sum at the Club, which he had no means whatever to meet on the coming morning. It was a rare event with him to take a retrospect of his life; and his theory was that he owed any success he had ever won to the fact that he brought to the present--to the actual casualty before him--an amount of concentration which men who look back or look forward never can command. Now, however, the past would force itself upon him, and his whole career, with all its faults and its failures, was before him. It was a bitter memory, the very bitterest one can imagine, not in its self-accusation or reproach, but in the thought of all the grand opportunities he had thrown away, the reckless way in which he had treated Fortune, believing that she never would fail him. All his regrets were for the occasions he had suffered to slip by him unprofitably. He did not waste a thought on those he had ruined, many of them young fellows starting hopefully, joyously in life. His mind only dwelt on such as had escaped his snares. Ay, the very fellows to whom he had lost largely that night, had once been in his power! He remembered them when they “joined;” he had met them when they landed at Calcutta, in all their raw inexperience of life, pressing their petty wagers upon him, and eagerly, almost ignominiously courting acquaintance with the favored aide-de-camp of the Governor-General. And there they were now, bronzed, hard-featured, shrewd men of the world, who had paid for their experience, and knew its worth.