"Time changes things; and you seem more like a stranger than you used to," returned Alice, a flush rising to her sensitive face. "But you spoke of raising money: I hope you are not in temporary embarrassment."
"A jolly good thing for me if it turns out only temporary," he rejoined. "Look at my position! Debts hanging over my head—for you may be sure, Alice, all young men, with a limited allowance and large expectations, contract debts—and thrust out of my uncle's home with just the loose cash I had in my pocket, and my clothes sent packing after me."
"Has the colonel stopped your allowance?"
Gerard Hope laid down the bracelet from whence he had taken it, before he replied.
"He stopped it then; it's months ago, you know; and I have not had a shilling since, except from my own resources. I first went upon tick; then I disposed of my watch and chain and all my other little matters of value: and now I am upon tick again."
Alice did not answer. The light tone vexed her.
"Perhaps you don't understand these free terms, Alice," he said, looking fondly at her, "and I hope you may never have occasion to. Frances would: she has lived in their atmosphere."
"Yes, I know what an embarrassed man the earl often is. But I am grieved to hear about yourself. Is the colonel implacable? What was the cause of the quarrel?"
"You know I was to be his heir. Even if more children had come to him, he undertook to provide amply for me. Last autumn he suddenly sent for me to tell me it was his pleasure and Lady Sarah's that I should take up my abode with them. So I did take it up, glad to get into such good quarters; and stopped here like an innocent, unsuspicious lamb, until—when was it, Alice? March? Then the plot came out."
"The plot," exclaimed Alice.