"Of course," he assented. "It is the want of private means that makes the uphill path so hard."
"Charles has his three hundred a year."
The faint pink in his cheeks, just the hue of a sea-shell, turned to crimson. I was sitting beyond the table, and saw it. He glanced across at me.
"It will take more money to make Charles a lawyer and to ensure him a footing afterwards in a good house than it would to get him called to the Bar," he said with a smile.
"Yes—perhaps so. But that is not quite the argument, Mr. Serjeant," said my stepmother. "Any young man who has three hundred a year may manage to live upon it."
"It is to be hoped so. I know I should have thought three hundred a year a perfect gold-mine."
"Then you see Charles need not starve while waiting for briefs to come in to him. Do you not see that, Mr. Serjeant?"
"I see it very clearly," he mildly said. "Had Charles his three hundred a year to fall back upon, he might have gone to the Bar had he liked, and risked the future."
"But he has it," Mrs. Carlen rejoined, surprise in her tone.
"No, madam, he has it not. Nor two hundred a year, nor one hundred."