"To anybody but you, George, it would be too self-evident to require any explanation. Why will you drive me to a thing so painful? Do you mean to say that he does not love me?"
"Better than his life, I believe; and better even than his money. But how does that bear upon the matter? They don't quote love upon the Stock Exchange."
"Oh George! And you think you are a business man!" Grace smiled gloriously through her tears, possibly through her triumph over me, probably through the joy of my assurance. "Can anybody do two things at once? Could my Jack attend to ups and downs, keep his whole mind intent on Argentinas, contangoes, fundangoes, holdovers, and holdunders, and even unspeakable Turks with fifty wives, when the whole of his pure heart was down here? Why he only went up about once a-week, if he could get me to go out nutting with him."
"Alas, I see. Neglected business. Left understrappers, and dashing young clerks, and trusty old codgers with pens behind their ears to stick to the stools, while he made sweet hay. But there must be something more than that."
"You turn everything into vulgarity, George. And you are capable of laughing at the most sacred things. But there was more than that, and a great deal more than that. You may have heard him speak in his grand confiding manner of a man named Franks, who has been with him many years. He has promoted him from place to place, and trusted him with almost everything; and I do believe that Franks had no intention of doing anything crooked. And he spoke in the most enthusiastic terms of me, though of course they never mention such a subject in the office. And when Black Friday came, as you know it did, through some very stupid error of the Government, Jack only laughed at first, except for the sake of some dear friends of his, who were hit rather hard; it appeared so ridiculous to suppose that a firm like his could be affected. But there proved to be something, I cannot quite understand it, although I keep my books so clearly that I know every farthing owing to me, something, some involvement, some terrible affair, which will force him to give up the Hall, and the shooting, and the pedigree Butterfly cows, and even me."
"Don't let him do it. Don't hear of it for a moment. You will never get such another fellow;" I exclaimed, as she turned away to wipe her glistening cheeks. "He'll come round as right as a roach in the end. You didn't let him off on that tack, I hope?"
"As for letting him off, dear George, is he a trout that I should treat him so? He is not like a slippery fish for a moment, but a deep-hearted, true-hearted, wonderful man. Why his conversation is as different from yours—but I will not depreciate you, unless you go against me. Only I should like to know how I can help myself. When a gentleman says—'I am truly sorry, but I can't have any more to do with you'—oh dear, oh dear, what can any lady do?"
"Lay hold of his coat, and say, 'None of that nonsense! I am the best judge of that question, and I have settled it the other way; unless you put up the bans within a month, you must favor me with the address of your Solicitors.'"
"Don't laugh at me. I have never laughed at you. I did tell him over and over again that the money could never make any difference to me, and indeed that I was very glad, except for his sake, because then nobody could ever say—but he talked of the duty of a man, and so forth, and the crime of allowing me to sacrifice myself, and a Cranleigh the wife of a bankrupt, and I don't know what else, for I broke down then, and he was obliged——"