"Well, I want the money. I want to try and get an honest start in life, and I think I shall buy land——"
"Out of the thousand pounds?" queried Mr. Grey, with a look of amused enjoyment.
"Out of the thousand pounds you are going to give me. Can't you see," added Farleg, sitting up in his chair, leaning both his elbows on the small table between them, "can't you see it's to your advantage as well as mine to give me a large sum?"
"Candidly I cannot," answered Mr. Grey, tapping Farleg encouragingly on the shoulder with his white left hand. "Tell me how it is. I am quite willing to be convinced."
"Well, if I take your five-and-twenty, I spend it here, or I spend it getting there, and then I'm stranded, don't you see, sir?"
"Go on." With two soft appreciative pats from the left white hand.
"Of course, as soon as I find myself hard up I come to you, or I write to you for more, and that would only be wasting your time."
"But," said Mr. Grey, with a sly look and a sly wag of his head, "if you got the thousand you might spend it here or there, and then you might again be applying to me. Ah, no! Joe, I don't think it would do to give you that thousand. You can have the twenty-five now, if you like."
"Well, sir, I've looked into the matter deeper than that. When you give me the thousand, I and my wife will leave this country, go to America, out West, and buy land. There we shall settle down as respectable people, and it would be no advantage to me to rake up the past, once I was settled down and prosperous. So, sir, if you please, I'll have the thousand."
There was respectful resolution in Farleg's voice as he spoke. The faces of the two men were not more than a foot apart now. They were looking as straight into one another's eyes as two experienced fencers when the play begins. Mr. Grey's face ceased to move, and took a settled expression of gracious badinage.