“Promise me, then,” said the young lady, conquered by his earnestness and undoubted honesty of intention, “that you will take no steps to compromise the honoured name of my dear father. Promise me that you will not show the bonds to strangers.”
“No eye but mine shall see them,” said Mr. Holdfast, opening his safe and depositing the prized securities in a secret drawer. “And now,” he continued, “you bank with me, and you draw from me fifty pounds, represented by eight five-pound notes and ten sovereigns in gold. Here they are. Count them. No? Very well. Count them when you get home, and take great care of them. You little know the roguery of human nature. There’s not a day that you cannot read in the London papers accounts of ladies having their pockets picked and their purses stolen. Let me see your purse. Why, it is a fairy purse! You cannot get half of this money into it. My dear young lady, we cannot live like the fairies. Human creatures are bound to be, to some small extent, practical. Take my purse—it is utterly unfit for your delicate hands, but it will answer its present purpose. See. I pack the money safely in it; take it home and put it in a place of safety.”
“How can I repay you?” asked the young lady, impressed no less by this gentleman’s generosity than by his wonderful kindness of manner.
“By saying we are friends,” he replied, “and by promising to come to see me soon again.”
“Of course, I must do that,” she said, gaily, “to see that my banker does not run away.”
The next thing he asked for was her address, but she was not inclined, at first, to give it to him; he appreciated the reason for her disinclination, and said that he had no intention of calling upon her, and that he wanted the address to use only in the event of its being necessary to write to her.
“I can trust you,” she said, and complied with his wish.
To his surprise and gratification the young lady, of her own accord, paid him a visit on the following day. She entered his office with a smiling face, causing, no doubt, quite a flutter in the hearts of Mr. Holdfast’s clerks and bookkeepers. It is not often so fair a vision is seen in a London’s merchant’s place of business.
From the young lady’s appearance Mr. Holdfast was led to believe that she had news of a joyful nature to communicate, and he was therefore very much astonished when she said, in the pleasantest manner: