"It's not a bit more cruel than the fact. Take your case and mine as an illustration. As the estimate of birth goes in this country, I'm as well born as the majority. My ancestors were New-Englanders, country doctors and lawyers and ministers—especially the ministers. But as long as I haven't the cash I'm only a tutor, and eat at the second table. Jim Rossiter's forebears were much the same as mine; but the fact that he has a hundred thousand dollars a year and I've hardly got two is the only thing that would be taken into consideration, by any one in either the United Kingdom or the United States. It would be the same if I descended from Crusaders. If I've got nothing but that and my character to recommend me—" He raised his hand and snapped his fingers with a scornful laugh. "Take your case," he hurried on as I was about to speak. "You're probably like me, sprung of a line of professional men—"
"And soldiers," I interrupted, proudly. "The first of my family to settle in Canada was a General Adare in the middle of the seventeen hundreds. He'd been in the garrison at Halifax and chose to remain in Nova Scotia." Perhaps there was some boastfulness in my tone as I added, "He came of the famous Fighting Adares of the County Limerick."
"And all that isn't worth a row of pins—except to yourself. If you were the daughter of a miner who'd struck it rich you'd be a candidate for the British peerage. You'd be received in the best houses in London; you could marry a duke and no one would say you nay. As it is—"
"As it is," I said, tremulously, "I'm just a nursery governess, and there's no getting away from the fact."
"Not until you get away from the condition."
"So that when I told Hugh Brokenshire the other day that in point of family I was his equal—"
"He probably didn't believe you."
The memory of Hugh's look still rankled in me. "No, I don't think he did."
"Of course he didn't. As the world counts—as we all count—no poor family, however noble, is the equal of any rich family, however base." There was that transformation of his smile from something sunny to something hard which I had noticed once before, as he went on to add, "If you want to marry Hugh Brokenshire—"
"Which I do," I interposed, defiantly.