"Oh, that I can't tell you. As soon as she fixes the day."
"I swear by all that I hold sacred," said Francis, with sudden energy, "that I won't wait more than six months, and then I'll take two thousand."
"Six? Make it twelve. The girl may want a year's freedom."
"I won't wait twelve. I swear I won't. I'm tired of this life. I can't get any work to do, though I've tried over and over again. And I'm always unlucky at play. There's Mary threatening to go out to work again. If we were in another country, with a clear start, she should not have to do that."
Oliver meditated. It did not seem to him likely that Ethel would refuse to marry him in six months' time, but of course it was possible. Still he was pretty sure that he could get the money advanced as soon as his engagement was noised abroad. It was rather a pity that he would have to publish it so soon—especially when his projects respecting Lesley Brooke had not been carried out—but it could not be helped. The prospect of ridding himself of his brother Francis was most welcome to him. And—if he could quiet him by promises, it might perhaps not be necessary to pay him the money after all.
"Well," he said, at last, "I promise it within six months, Francis. On the conditions I named, of course."
"And you will keep your word?" said Francis, looking suspiciously into his brother's smooth, pale face.
"If not," answered Oliver, airily, "you have the remedy in your own hands, you know. You can easily bring me to book. And now that this interesting conversation is ended, perhaps you will kindly allow me to go home? The night is fine, but I am a good deal chilled with standing——"
"And what am I, then? I've been waiting for you, off and on, for hours. And I haven't got a shilling in my pocket, either. Haven't you got a pound or two to spare, Oliver? For the sake of old times, you know."
Some men would have found it pitiful to hear poor Francis Trent, with his broken-down, cringing, crafty look, thus sueing for a sovereign. For he had the air of a ruined gentleman, not of an ordinary beggar, and the signs of refinement in his face and bearing made his state of abasement and destitution more apparent. But Oliver was not touched by any such sentimental considerations. He looked at first as if he were about to refuse his brother's request; but policy dictated another course. He must not drive to desperation the man in whose hands lay his character and perhaps his future fortune. He put his hand into his pocket, brought out a couple of sovereigns, and dropped them into Francis' greedily outstretched palm. Then he crossed the road towards his sister's house, while the elder brother slunk away with an air of anything but triumph. It was sad to see him so depressed, so broken-spirited, so hopeless. For he had been meant for better things. But his will was weak, his principles had never been settled, and with his first lapse from honesty all self-respect seemed to leave him. Thenceforth he went down hill, and would long ago have reached the bottom but for the one helping hand that had been held out to stay him in his mad career. That hand belonged to none of his kith and kin, however. It was seamed and roughened and reddened by honest toil; but the toil had at least been honest and the toiler's love for the fine gentleman for whom she worked was loving and sincere. To cut a long story short, Francis Trent had married a dressmaker of the lower grade, and a dressmaker, moreover, who had once been a ladies'-maid.