“Yes. 'Pon my soul I am. The Hampstead place and all.”
“Sell North End House!” cried poor Mr. Wade, in bewilderment. “You'd sell it? Why, the carvings by Grinling Gibbons are the finest in England.”
“I can't help that,” laughed Mr. Richard, ringing the bell. “I want cash, and cash I must have.—Breakfast, Smithers.—I'm going to travel.”
Francis Wade was breathless with astonishment. Educated and reared as he had been, he would as soon have thought of proposing to sell St. Paul's Cathedral as to sell the casket which held his treasures of art—his coins, his coffee-cups, his pictures, and his “proofs before letters”.
“Surely, Richard, you are not in earnest?” he gasped.
“I am, indeed.”
“But—but who will buy it?”
“Plenty of people. I shall cut it up into building allotments. Besides, they are talking of a suburban line, with a terminus at St. John's Wood, which will cut the garden in half. You are quite sure you've breakfasted? Then pardon me.”
“Richard, you are jesting with me! You will never let them do such a thing!”
“I'm thinking of a trip to America,” said Mr. Richard, cracking an egg. “I am sick of Europe. After all, what is the good of a man like me pretending to belong to 'an old family', with 'a seat' and all that humbug? Money is the thing now, my dear uncle. Hard cash! That's the ticket for soup, you may depend.”