"Well, I haven't exactly determined. The money, you see, is of no moment to me, and I couldn't get it back any how. He'll never be worth a half-penny, that rascal. I might prosecute, and nobody would blame me; indeed, if I were to decline marrying your sister, and cut the whole set of you, I don't see," and he drew himself up, "that any thing could be said against me. But—"
Perhaps, hard man as he was, he was touched by the agony of suspense in Hilary's face, for he added.
"Come, come, I won't disgrace your family; I won't do any thing to harm the fellow."
"Thank you!" said Hilary, in a mechanical, unnatural voice.
"As for my money, he's welcome to it, and much good may it do him. 'Set a beggar on horseback, and he'll ride to the devil,' and in double quick time too. I won't hinder him. I wash my hands of the young scape-grace. But he'd better not come near me again."
"No," acquiesced Hilary, absently.
"In fact," said Mr. Ascott, with a twinkle of his sharp eye, "I have already taken measures to frighten him away, so that he may make himself scarce, and give neither you nor me any farther trouble. I drove up to your door with a policeman, asked to see Mr. Leaf, and when I heard that he was out—a lie, of course I left word I'd be back in half an hour. Depend upon it," and he winked confidentially, "he will smell a rat, and make a moonlight flitting of it, and we shall never hear of him any more."
"Never hear of Ascott any more?" repeated Hilary; and for an instant she ceased to think of him as what he was—swindler, forger, ungrateful to his benefactors, a disgrace to his home and family. She saw only the boy Ascott, with his bright looks and pleasant ways, whom his aunts had brought up from his cradle, and loved with all his faults—perhaps loved still. "Oh, I must go home. This will break Johanna's heart!"
Mr. Peter Ascott possibly never had a heart, or it had been so stunted in its growth that it had never reached its fair development. Yet he felt sorry in his way for the "young person," who looked so deadly white, yet tried so hard not to make a scene, nay, when her two assistants came into the one little parlor, deported herself with steady composure; told them that she was obliged suddenly to go home, but would be back, if possible, the next morning. Then, in that orderly, accurate way which Peter Ascott could both understand and appreciate, she proceeded to arrange with them about the shop and the house in case she might be detained till Monday.
"You're not a bad woman of business," said he, with a patronizing air. "This seems a tidy little shop; I dare say you'll get on in it."