"Major Marvel, if you are going to abuse my father and mother as well as lord Gartley,—" cried Hester, but he interrupted her.
"Ah, there it is!" exclaimed he bitterly. "Lord Gartley!—I have no business to interfere—no more than your gardener or coachman! but to think of an angel like you in the arms of a——"
"Major Marvel!"
—"I beg ten thousand pardons, cousin Hester! but I am so damnably in earnest I can't pick and choose my phrases. Believe me the man is not worthy of you."
"What have you got against him?—I do hate backbiting! As his friend I ask you what you have against him."
"That's the pity of it! I can't tell you anything very bad of him. But a man of whom no one has anything good to say—one of whom never a warm word is uttered—"
"I have called him my friend!" said Hester.
"That's the worst of it! If it were not for that he might go to the devil for me!—I daresay you think it a fine thing he should have stuck to business so long!
"He was put to that before there was much chance of his succeeding; his aunt would not have him on her hands consuming the money she meant for the earldom. His elder brother would have had it, but he killed himself before it fell due: there are things that must not be spoken of to young ladies. I don't say your friend has disgraced himself; he has not: by George, it takes a good deal for that in his set! But not a soul out of his own family cares two-pence for him."
"There are some who are better liked everywhere than at home, and they're not the better sort," said Hester. "That goes for less than nothing. I know the part of him chance acquaintances cannot know. He does not bear his heart on his sleeve. I assure you, major Marvel, he is a man of uncommon gifts and—"