“I shall do nothing of the kind. Find them out for yourself.”
“And how about me?” There was a tone almost of abject anxiety in Judge Barton’s voice.
“Ah, you! You know that you draw sight drafts on the universe daily.”
“Which are seldom honored,” the Judge remarked somewhat bitterly.
“This is all getting blamed mysterious to me,” interrupted Collingwood. “I wish you two would talk down to my level.”
“Talk up to it, you mean,” replied Charlotte good-naturedly. “For you cannot believe for an instant that the irresponsible demands of two persons asking for the impossible are to be put on a higher level than a practical demand like yours that can be expressed in figures, even if it runs into seven. You ask nothing of life, Martin, that isn’t in it; while those drafts of Judge Barton, as well as my own, are drawn on an ideal universe. The Judge and I are not content with things as they are. We do not own up often, but this seems a propitious moment. Deep in his heart each of us is echoing that old refrain of Omar’s.
“Ah Love! could you and I with Him conspire
To grasp this sorry Scheme of Things entire,
Would not we shatter it to bits—and then
Remould it nearer to the Heart’s Desire!”