"She's as tall as you are. I've seen her play athletes to a standstill at tennis."
"But she's so refined, so—"
"Oh, fudge!" muttered Arkwright. Then louder: "Didn't I tell you not to talk to me about this business?"
"But I've got to do it," protested Craig. "You're the only one I can talk to—without being a cad."
Arkwright looked disgusted. "You love the girl," he said bitterly, "and she wants you. Marry her."
"But I haven't got the money."
Craig was out with the truth at last. "What would we live on? My salary is only seventy-five hundred dollars. If I get the Attorney-Generalship it'll be only eight thousand, and I've not got twenty thousand dollars besides. As long as I'm in politics I can't do anything at the law. All the clients that pay well are clients I'd not dare have anything to do with—I may have to prosecute them. Grant, I used to think Government salaries were too big, and I used to rave against office-holders fattening on the people. I was crazy. How's a man to marry a LADY and live like a GENTLEMAN on seven or eight thousand a year? It can't be done."
"And you used to rave against living like a gentleman," thrust Grant maliciously.
Craig reddened. "There it is!" he fairly shouted. "I'm going to the devil. I'm sacrificing all my principles. That's what this mixing with swell people and trying to marry a fashionable lady is doing for me!"
"You're broadening out, you mean. You're losing your taste for tommy-rot."