“He was a thief when I knew him,” said Lionel still more emphatically, “and the confederate of that ruffian Gibbs. What a fine old fellow, that father of his, to disinherit the vagabond!”
“It was a great blow to him, though he prospers still,” said Arthur.
“And I might have had some of the beggar’s money,” said Lionel, “had I married his sister. By heavens! I would have pitched it into the river!”
“He does not want money, they say,” Arthur went on. “His losses have been great lately, but he talks of going into parliament. In fact he has selected my native town for the honour of his candidature.”
“Happy coincidence! Severntown was to have supplied me with a seat in the house, if I had not been fool enough to run my head into that Ashford Club den, and consented to soil my fingers with their filthy Stock Exchange ventures. Upon my soul it is time I disappeared from the land altogether.”
Lionel strode on as if he were keeping pace with his thoughts, and intended to stride out of the land at once, and then he broke out into a loud ironical laugh as he said,—
“Fancy anybody contesting a seat with a scoundrel like that fellow Tallant; and yet Amy is his sister, and my sister-in-law. We must all have been eating of the insane root, Arthur.”
“Fact is stranger than fiction,” said the artist.
“Fiction! Fiction halts miles behind the ordinary facts of daily life. What is this fellow then?”
“A great financier, I suppose they would call him: his chief position is that of managing director of the Meter Iron Works Company, which his father founded,—one of the richest corporations in the land, I believe.”