"Don't talk to me like that, Joyce. Do you think I have anything at heart except your interests? As to Mr. Dysart, if you like him, I confess I should be glad of it. He is only a cousin of the Baltimores, and of such moderate means that they would scarcely object to his marrying a penniless girl."
"You rate me highly," says Joyce, with a sudden rather sharp little laugh. "I am good enough for the cousin—I am not good enough for the brother, who may reasonably look higher."
"Not higher," haughtily. "He can only marry a girl of good birth. You are that, but he, in his position, will look for money, or else his people will look for it for him. Whereas, Mr. Dysart——"
"Yes, you needn't go over it all. Mr. Dysart is about on a level with me, he will never have any money, neither shall I." Suddenly she looks round at her sister, her eyes very bright. "Tell me then," says she, "what does it all come to? That I am bound to refuse to marry a man because he has money, and because I have none."
"That is not the argument," says Barbara anxiously.
"I think it is."
"It is not. I advise you strongly not to think of Mr. Beauclerk, yet he has no money to speak of."
"He has more than Freddy."
"But he is a different man from Freddy—with different tastes, different aspirations, different——He's different," emphatically, "in every way!"
"To be different from the person one loves is not to be a bad man," says Joyce slowly, her eyes on the ground.