"'No,' said I, 'I 'm a younger son,—I 've got my commission in the Guards, and eight thousand in the "Three-and-a-Half's" to live on, so that I can't.'
"'What can you pay?' said he.
"'I can stand two thousand,' said I, boldly.
"'Say three,' said he,—'say three.'
"And I said, 'Three be it,' and the affair was settled—an exposure escaped—a reputation rescued—and a clear saving of something like ten thousand pounds; and this just because we chanced both of us to be 'men of the world.' For look at the thing calmly; how should any of us have been bettered by a three days' publicity at Nisi Prius,—one's little tendernesses ridiculed by Thesiger, and their soft speeches slanged by Serjeant Wilkins. Turn it over in your mind how you may, and the same conclusion always meets you. The husband, it is true, gets less money; but then he has no obloquy. The wife escapes exposure; and the 'other party' is only mulct to one-fourth of his liability, and at the same time is exempt from all the ruffianism of the long robe! A vulgarly minded fellow might have said, 'What's the woman's reputation to me? I'll defend the action,—I'll prove this, that, and t'other. I'll engage the first counsel at the bar, and fight the battle out. I don't care a jot about being blackguarded before a jury, lampooned in the papers, and caricatured in the windows,' he might say; 'what signifies to me what character I hold before the world,—I have neither sons nor daughters to suffer from my disgrace.' I know that all these and similar reasons might prompt a man of a certain stamp to regret this course, and say, 'Be it so. Let there be a trial!' But neither you nor I Dodd, could see the matter in this light. There is this peculiarity about a man of the world, that not alone he sees rightly, but he sees quickly; he judges passing events with a kind of instinctive appreciation of what will be the tone of society generally, and he says to himself, 'There are doubtless elements in this question that I would wish otherwise. I would, perhaps, say this is not exactly to my taste; I don't like that;' but whoever yet found that he broke his leg exactly in the right place? What man ever discovered that the toothache ever attacked the very tooth he wanted! I take it, Dodd, that you are a man who has seen a good deal of life; now did your heart ever bound with delight on seeing the outside of a bill of costs? or on hearing the well-known knock of a better known dun at your hall door? True philosophy consists in diminishing, so far as may be, the inevitable ills of life. Don't you agree with me?"
"With the general proposition I do, my Lord; the question here is, how far the present case may be considered as coming within your theory. Suppose now, just for argument's sake, I was to observe that there was no similarity between our situations; that while you openly avow culpability, I as distinctly deny it."
"You prefer to die innocent, Dodd?" said he, puffing his cigar coolly as he spoke.
"I prefer, my Lord, to maintain the vantage ground that I feel under my feet. Had you been patient enough to hear me out, I could have explained to your perfect satisfaction how I came here, and why. I could have shown you a reason for everything that may possibly seem strange or mysterious—"
"As, for instance, the assumption of a name and title that did not belong to you,—a fortnight's close seclusion to avoid discovery,—the sudden departure for Ems, and headlong haste of your journey here,—and, finally, the attitude of more than persuasive eloquence in which I myself saw you. Of course, to a man of an ingenious and inventive turn, all these things are capable of at least some approach to explanation. Lawyers do the thing every day,—some, with tears in their eyes, with very affecting appeals to Heaven, according to the sums marked on the outside of the briefs. If your case had been one of murder, I could have got you a very clever fellow who would have invoked divine vengeance on his own head in open court if he were not in heart and soul assured of your spotless innocence! But now please to bear in mind that we are not in Westminster Hall. We are here talking frankly and honestly, man to man,—sophistry and special pleading avail nothing; and here I candidly tell you, that, turn the matter how you will, the advice I have given is the only feasible and practicable mode of escaping from this difficulty."
If you think me prolix, my dear Purcell, in narrating so circumstantially every part of this curious interview, just remember that I am naturally anxious to bring to bear upon your mind the force of argument to which mine at last yielded. It is very possible I may not be able to present these reasonings with all the strength and vigor with which they appealed to myself. I may—like a man who plays chess with himself—favor one side a little more than the other, or it is possible that I may seem weaker in my self-defence than I ought to have been. However you interpret my conduct on this trying occasion, give me the benefit of never having for a moment forgotten the fame and fortune of that lovely creature whose fate was in my hands, and whom I have rescued at a heavy price.