"Well;—yes. She is your cousin, but a distant one only; and I'm not aware that cousinship gives any claim."
"Who is she to have a claim on? I'm the nearest she has got. Besides, am not I going to take all the property which ought to be hers?"
"That's just it. There's no such ought in the case. The property is as much your own as this poker is mine. That's exactly the mistake I want you to guard against. If you liked her, and chose to marry her, that would be all very well; presuming that you don't want to get money in marriage."
"I hate the idea of marrying for money."
"All right. Then marry Miss Amedroz if you please. But don't make any rash undertakings to be her father, or her brother, or her uncle, or her aunt. Such romance always leads a man into trouble."
"But I've done it already."
"What do you mean?"
"I've told her that I would be her brother, and that as long as I had a shilling she should never want sixpence. And I mean it. And as for what you say about romance and repenting it, that simply comes from your being a lawyer."
"Thank ye, Will."
"If one goes to a chemist, of course one gets physic, and has to put up with the bad smells."