“Oho! you’ve refused the partnership in the business as well, have you? And how, may I ask, d’you mean to support my daughter when you’re married? Or is your Mightiness going to refuse her too?”
Sebastian held his head very high, as he replied that nothing in the world would induce him to give up Letty.
“And how d’you mean to keep her, eh?” repeated his future father-in-law, stubbornly.
Mrs. Johnson detected trouble brewing; and clinched matters, so she thought, by a brilliant compromise:
“Couldn’t you take half of what your father offers you, Sebastian? I’m sure seven hundred and fifty pounds a year is quite as much as any wife needs to start on. Isn’t it, Letty?”
“Taking half would be exactly the same as taking all,” retorted Sebastian, desperate now of forcing understanding.
“You’re wrong there, my lad. It ’ud be just less than fifteen hundred quid by one half of fifteen hundred quid, which is seven fifty. But there’s to be no halves about this business, mother; d’you mark me, Letty? Are you attendin’, Sebastian Levi? I’m not going to have my girl waitin’ about the best years of her life for a young fool who didn’t know when he was well off. I like your father; we were neighbours once, he and I; and I liked you well enough till now, though not a patch on him. But unless you come to me in a week or two with all these taradiddles biffed out of your head—then biff goes the wedding!” Mr. Johnson rose to his feet, and in time-honoured fashion whacked at the table with his clenched fist. “And meantime you’re not to see so much of her, either. Come along, mother; come along, Letty”; summoning his women-folk from the room, he marched forth. Mrs. Johnson followed meekly; her laborious tolerance shrivelled to nothing at this first hot blast from the actual furnace of ‘advanced ideas.’
Sebastian caught at Letty’s hands, as she passed him—
“Letty?”