But he felt that he owed it to her, as to a comrade who had on the whole been loyal to him, to have some personal explanation with herself. He arranged in his own mind the sort of speech that he would make to her. "Of course you know it can't be. It was all arranged because you were to have a lot of money, and now it turns out that you haven't got any. And I haven't got any, and we should have nothing to live upon. It's out of the question. But, upon my word, I'm very sorry, for I like you very much, and I really think we should have got on uncommon well together." That was the kind of speech that he suggested to himself, but he did not know how to find for himself the opportunity of making it. He thought that he must put it all into a letter. But then that would be tantamount to a written confession that he had made her an offer of marriage, and he feared that Melmotte,--or Madame Melmotte on his behalf, if the great man himself were absent, in prison,--might make an ungenerous use of such an admission.

; but he felt that he owed it to her to explain.
He imagined what he would say. "Of course you know it can't be, now that it turns out that you haven't got any money. And I haven't got any, and we should have nothing to live upon. But, upon my word, I'm very sorry, for I like you very much, and I really think we should have got on uncommon well together."
