“Are you telling me?” he asked incredulously.
“I’m swearing it down your throat,” she cried. “If I had a friend in this countryside he would be pitying my shame that I must be bargained for like beast at a fair and not have a word in the bargain.”
“My name’s what my name may be,” said he, putting out an arm and addressing the world, “and you are my master’s daughter; I would cut off that hand to save you a minute’s vexation. What did Black Duncan know but that you had the picking of the gentleman yourself—and you might have picked worse, though I tell you I did not care to hear about the money in it.”
“The money,” she exclaimed, turning pale to the lips; “then—then—then there’s money in it?”
“He’s a smart young fellow——”
“No name, no name, or you are no friend of mine! Money, you say?”
“I could have picked no better for you myself.”
“Did you say money?”
“I thought once there might be something.”
“Money, money,” she repeated to herself.