"That's--I am far from wishing to have any unpleasantness with you, Mr. Andrews, but--you must know that that's all tuppence."
"Pray, Mr. Elmore, what do you mean by that? A will's a will; its terms are not to be lightly set aside."
"You have not told me how old you are, Mr. Andrews, but you have told me that you are my uncle's senior."
"So far as head for business goes, I am as young as ever I was."
"I will not contradict you. I am inclined to think that you are as you were--thirty, forty years ago--that is, in a commercial sense, a thousand years behind the times."
"You have no right to say that. What do you know about business--a young man like you?"
"I am a man of business, Mr. Andrews."
"I was not aware of it until this moment."
"You will be more clearly aware of it before long. I was prepared to marry my cousin had she been penniless, as only the other day--if she married me--she bade fair to be. In that event I would have made her fortune, and my own, as sure as you are sitting there. As events have turned out, so far from being penniless, she is, shall we say, the three-fourths proprietor of a flourishing business, with, probably, all the capital at her command which is needed for its development. Under such circumstances, why should I not devote my energies to the aggrandisement of her business? If I do, do you suppose for one instant--will or no will--that the management of affairs will be in your hands? That you will lead, and I shall follow? Absurd, Andrews; the business has reached a stage at which it can branch out advantageously in a dozen different directions."
"I believe there's something in what you say--if it's in the hands of the right man."