“Anything in my poor house is yours,” answered Castell courteously, and in Oriental form.
“I rejoice to hear it, Señor, for I seek something from your house.”
Castell looked a question at him with his quick black eyes.
“I seek your daughter, the Señora Margaret, in marriage.”
Castell stared at him, then a single word broke from his lips.
“Impossible.”
“Why impossible?” asked d’Aguilar slowly, yet as one who expected some such answer. “In age we are not unsuited, nor perhaps in fortune, while of rank I have enough, more than you guess perhaps. I vaunt not myself, yet women have thought me not uncomely. I should be a good friend to the house whence I took a wife, where perchance a day may come when friends will be needed; and lastly, I desire her not for what she may bring with her, though wealth is always welcome, but—I pray you to believe it—because I love her.”
“I have heard that the Señor d’Aguilar loves many women, yonder in Granada.”
“As I have heard that the Margaret had a prosperous voyage, Señor Castell. Rumour, as I said but now, is a lying jade. Yet I will not copy her. I have been no saint. Now I would become one, for Margaret’s sake. I will be true to your daughter, Señor. What say you now?”
Castell only shook his head.