“Just what I am trying to find out,” replied Abel, lightly, as he threw his cigar away. “And now I put it to you, father, as a man of the world and a sensible, sagacious, successful merchant, am I not more likely to meet and marry such a girl, if I live generously in society, than if I shut myself up to be a mere dig?”
Mr. Newt was not sure. Perhaps it was so. Upon the whole, it probably was so.
Mr. Abel did not happen to suggest to his father that, for the purpose of marrying an heiress, if he should ever chance to be so fortunate as to meet one, and, having met her, to become enamored so that he might be justified in wooing her for his wife—that for all these contingencies it was a good thing for a young man to have a regular business connection and apparent employment—and very advantageous, indeed, that that connection should be with a man so well known in commercial and fashionable circles as his father. That of itself was one of the great advantages of credit. It was a frequent joke of Abel’s with his father, after the recent conversation, that credit was the most creditable thing going.
CHAPTER XXX. — CHECK.
During these brilliant days of young bachelorhood Abel, by some curious chance, had not met Hope Wayne, who was passing the winter in New York with her Aunt Dinks, and who had hitherto declined all society. It was well known that she was in town. The beautiful Boston heiress was often enough the theme of discourse among the youth at Abel’s rooms.
“Is she really going to marry that Dinks? Why, the man’s a donkey!” said Corlaer Van Boozenberg.
“And are there no donkeys among your married friends?” inquired Abel, with the air of a naturalist pursuing his researches.
One day, indeed, as he was passing Stewart’s, he saw Hope alighting from a carriage. He was not alone; and as he passed their eyes met. He bowed profoundly. She bent her head without speaking, as one acknowledges a slight acquaintance. It was not a “cut,” as Abel said to himself; “not at all. It was simply ranking me with the herd.”