"What occupation?"
"The saying and doing all sorts of wild things to make her think ill of me. She goes and whispers them to Mr. Edwin Barley. He listens to her—I know he does, and that provokes me. Well, little pet, what are those honest brown eyes of yours longing to say?"
"Why did you marry him, Selina?"
"People say for money, Anne. I say it was fate."
"He persuaded you, perhaps?"
"He did. Persuaded, pressed, worried me. He was two years talking me into it. Better, perhaps, that he had given his great love elsewhere! Better for him, possibly, that he had married Charlotte Delves!"
"But did he want to marry Charlotte Delves?"
"Never. I don't believe that even the thought ever entered his head. The servants say she used to hope it; but they rattle nonsense at random. Edwin Barley never cared but for two things in the world: myself and money."
"Money?"
"Money, Anne. Pretty little pieces of gold and silver; new, crisp bank-notes; yellow old deeds of parchment, representing houses and lands. He cares for money almost as much as for me; and he'll care for it more than for me in time. Who's this?"