that there was a better life than they offered to him. But was he
sure that he had found it to be better? He had certainly sighed for
the gauds which he had left. While his young wife was living he had
kept his sighs down, so that she should not hear them; but he had
been forced to acknowledge that his new life had been vapid and
flavourless. Now he had been tempted back again to the old haunts.
Would the Countesses' cards be showered upon him again?

One card, or rather note, had reached him while he was yet at
Tankerville, reminding him of old days. It was from Mrs. Low, the
wife of the barrister with whom he had worked when he had been a
law student in London. She had asked him to come and dine with them
after the old fashion in Baker Street, naming a day as to which she
presumed that he would by that time have finished his affairs at
Tankerville, intimating also that Mr. Low would then have finished
his at North Broughton. Now Mr. Low had sat for North Broughton
before Phineas left London, and his wife spoke of the seat as a
certainty. Phineas could not keep himself from feeling that Mrs. Low
intended to triumph over him; but, nevertheless, he accepted the
invitation. They were very glad to see him, explaining that, as
nobody was supposed to be in town, nobody had been asked to meet
him. In former days he had been very intimate in that house, having
received from both of them much kindness, mingled, perhaps, with some
touch of severity on the part of the lady. But the ground for that
was gone, and Mrs. Low was no longer painfully severe. A few words
were said as to his great loss. Mrs. Low once raised her eyebrows in
pretended surprise when Phineas explained that he had thrown up his
place, and then they settled down on the question of the day. "And
so," said Mrs. Low, "you've begun to attack the Church?" It must be
remembered that at this moment Mr. Daubeny had not as yet electrified