"Ha!"
"Apprehended on suspicion of stealing that gold chain and seals which you wear so ostentatiously."
"By goles, but you're a clever fellow," said Darvil, involuntarily; "you know human natur."
The banker smiled: strange to say, he was pleased with the compliment.
"But," resumed Darvil, helping himself to another slice of beef, "you are in the wrong box—planted in Queer Street, as /we/ say in London; for if you care a d—n about my daughter's respectability, you will never muzzle her father on suspicion of theft—and so there's tit for tat, my old gentleman!"
"I shall deny that you are her father, Mr. Darvil; and I think you will find it hard to prove the fact in any town where I am a magistrate."
"By goles, what a good prig you would have made! You are as sharp as a gimlet. Surely you were brought up at the Old Bailey!"
"Mr. Darvil, be ruled. You seem a man not deaf to reason, and I ask you whether, in any town in this country, a poor man in suspicious circumstances can do anything against a rich man whose character is established? Perhaps you are right in the main: I have nothing to do with that. But I tell you that you shall quit this house in half an hour—that you shall never enter it again but at your peril; and if you do—within ten minutes from that time you shall be in the town gaol. It is no longer a contest between you and your defenceless daughter; it is a contest between—"
"A tramper in fustian, and a gemman as drives a coach," interrupted
Darvil, laughing bitterly, yet heartily. "Good—good!"
The banker rose. "I think you have made a very clever definition," said he. "Half an hour—you recollect—good evening."