If the squire had expected his auditor to express astonishment or chagrin, he was agreeably relieved, for Bartley Bradstone merely nodded his head.
“It is a matter of perfect indifference to me, sir,” he said, with a shrug of the shoulders. “It is Olivia I want, not money; thank Heaven I have enough—too much, perhaps—of that already. If you give me your consent——”
“One moment more,” said the squire, interrupting him in a low voice. “It is my duty to tell you something more, Bradstone. If you are utterly indifferent to the fact that she will have no dowry, you may consider that, as my only child, she will and should inherit this,” and he waved his hand. “What if I tell you that she will not even do that?”
Again Bartley Bradstone expressed neither surprise nor disappointment.
“No?” he said. “Well, that is of no consequence to me, sir. As I said, it is Olivia I want, not money nor the Grange; though, mind you, I think it a pity that a fine old property that has been in the family so long——”
“Should depart from it forever,” said the squire, in a low, sorrow-stricken voice. “A pity! Yes! But so it must be! Bradstone, having told you this much, I may—indeed, it is my duty to—tell you all. You see before you a man who is a living lie”—his voice broke—“a sham and a counterfeit, the Squire of Hawkwood who cannot give his daughter a poor thousand pounds as a wedding present, the lord of the manor every acre of which he is in hourly danger of losing. Bradstone, I am weighed down, sunk to my neck in debt, and the Grange may at any moment be in the bailiff’s hands.”
He did not drop into a chair or burst into tears, did not even utter a groan, but stood with pale, set face and steady, unflinching eyes—the aristocrat even in this moment of his deepest humiliation, the humiliation of having to confess his ruin to this parvenu, would-be son-in-law.
Bartley Bradstone looked at him with the grudging admiration of a vulgar mind for that higher type which it can never hope even to imitate; how he would have sighed and groaned and groveled if he had had to make such a confession!
“There is my case,” said the squire, after a moment’s pause. “And I shall not deem you selfish or unreasonable if, after having heard it, you withdraw your proposal, Bradstone.”
“But I do not do anything of the sort,” said Bartley Bradstone. “I repeat it. It makes no difference to me, sir—not a bit. As to the estate going, I’m not so sure that that can’t be prevented.”