Phineas Redux II

Phineas gets into a quarrel with a Mr Bonteen, one of his rivals in the party. Glencora takes up his cause and tries to persuade her husband to support Phineas and not Bonteen. The two men are antagonistic when they meet, and Bonteen snubs Phineas when they meet a gentlemen's club. The Prince of Wales is there so the row is curbed, but soon afterwards, Phineas leaves the club and makes a joke of how much he dislikes Bonteen. He walks part of his way home with his friend Mr Monk, and then goes on alone to his lodgings. The following day, the police arrive, and Phineas is accused of murdering Bonteen who has been discovered dead in an alleyway. He is horrified but he's taken into custody. The bad feeling between the men and the fact that he does not have an alibi means he goes to trial. Phineas has support from his society friends but he fears that some may believe him guilty. He finds that Laura's husband has died, and she comes to visit him in prison. She tries to support him but she is emotional and weepy. Meanwhile, Marie Goesler and Glencora have been doing some detective work. Bonteen and his wife had supported Lizzie Eustace who has (after a scandal of her diamonds being stolen) married a foreign clergyman, Mr Emilius. He treated her cruelly and she left him. Mrs Bonteen had some sympathy for her and because of this Emilius was known to have a grudge against him. Marie goes to Prague, where its believed that Emilius has a wife whom he has deserted, and she finds a locksmith who made a key for him, so that he could get in and out of his lodging house. Armed with this evidence, she brings it back to London where Phineas' trial is not going well. Mme Goesler's evidence about the latch key however clears him and he is pronounced not guilty. Emilius is to be arrested. Phineas is badly shaken by his ordeal, and he goes home to his lodgings, to the kindly woman who has been his housekeeper, Mrs Bunce. He is hurt that he could not be sure if his friends really believed in him, and he feels badly about his anger at Bonteen. He does not want to go into society, but after a while, he accepts an invitation to Matching, where Glencora lives. She has now become Duchess of Omnium as the old Duke has died. Mme Goesler is staying there as she often does, and on an impulse, Phineas proposes to her. She accepts him, and they begin to make plans for marriage. She tells him that she was proposed to by the old Duke and refused him. He and she happily look forward to a successful political career.