“Paltry!” ejaculated the captain. “When he must be making so much of it!”
“Rolling in it, so to say,” confirmed Mrs. Knox. “Look at the practice he has! But if he did not give me any of his, he might advance me a trifle of Mina’s.”
“Of course he might,” warmly acquiesced Captain Collinson.
What with the warmth and the sympathy, Mrs. Knox rather lost her head. Many of us are betrayed on occasion into doing the same. That is, she said more than she should have said.
“You see, if Mina married, as I pointed out to Arnold, the money would no longer be under his control at all. It would be hers to do as she pleased with. She is a dear, good, generous girl, and would not scruple to let me have one or two hundred pounds. What would such a trifle be out of the whole seven thousand?”
“Very true; nothing at all,” cried the captain, toying with his handsome beard.
“But no; Arnold will not hear of it: he answered me in a way that I should not like to repeat. He also said he should take care, if Mina did marry before she was of age, that her money was settled upon her; said it on purpose to thwart me.”
“Cruel!” aspirated the captain.
“Some girls might be tempted to marry off-hand, and say nothing to him, if only to get her fortune out of his control. I don’t say Mina would.”
“Miser! My dear madam, rely upon it that whenever Miss Mina does marry, her husband will join with her in letting you have as much money as you wish. I am sure it would be his pride and pleasure to do so.”