‘Am I to believe that, when—’ began Lucilla, slowly.
‘The last resource of desperation,’ cried Owen. ‘What could I do with such a drain upon me; the old woman for ever clamouring for money, and threatening exposure? My allowance? Poor Honor meant well, but she gave me just enough to promote expensive habits without supplying them. There was nothing to fall back on—except the ways of the Castle Blanch folk.’
‘Betting?’
He nodded. ‘So when it went against me, and people would have it that I had expectations, it was not for me to contradict them. It was their business, not mine, to look out for themselves, and pretty handsomely they have done so. It would have been a very different percentage if I had been an eldest son. As it is, my bond is—what is it for, Lucy?’
‘Six hundred.’
‘How much do you think I have touched of that? Not two! Of that, three-fourths went to the harpies I fell in with at Paris, under Charles’s auspices—and five-and-twenty there’—pointing in the direction of Whittington-street.
‘Will the man be satisfied with the two hundred?’
‘Don’t he wish he may get it? But, Lucy, you are not to make a mess of it. I give you warning I shall go, and never be heard of more, if Honor is applied to.’
‘I had rather die than do so.’
‘You are not frantic enough to want to do it out of your own money? I say, give me those papers.’