“I don’t want to see her,” I said.
“Probably not. But you will scarcely be able to avoid doing so when you live at Willowsmere Court.”
“One is not obliged to know everybody in the neighbourhood,”—I observed superciliously.
Lucio laughed aloud.
“How well you carry your fortunes, Geoffrey!” he said—“
For a poor devil of a Grub-street hack who lately was at a loss for a sovereign, how perfectly you follow the fashions of your time! If there is one man more than another that moves me to wondering admiration it is he who asserts his wealth strenuously in the face of his fellows, and who comports himself in this world as though he could bribe death and purchase the good-will of the Creator. It is such splendid effrontery,—such superlative pride! Now I, though over-wealthy myself, am so curiously constituted that I cannot wear my bank-notes in my countenance as it were,—I have put in a claim for intellect as well as [p 185] gold,—and sometimes, do you know, in my travels round the world, I have been so far honoured as to be taken for quite a poor man! Now you will never have that chance again;—you are rich and you look it!”
“And you,—” I interrupted him suddenly, and with some warmth—“do you know what you look? You imply that I assert my wealth in my face; do you know what you assert in your every glance and gesture?”
“I cannot imagine!” he said smiling.
“Contempt for us all!” I said—“Immeasurable contempt,—even for me, whom you call friend. I tell you the truth, Lucio,—there are times, when in spite of our intimacy I feel that you despise me. I daresay you do; you have an extraordinary personality united to extraordinary talents; you must not however expect all men to be as self-restrained and as indifferent to human passions as yourself.”
He gave me a swift, searching glance.