"Listen," says Pinckney, "to that superior being, the lordly Briton, utter his usual piffle! I suppose you'd like to marry, settle down on a hundred-acre estate nine miles from nowhere, and do the country gentleman?"
"It would be the making of me," says Larry, "and I could be reasonably happy at it."
"Then why not do it?" demands Pinckney.
"On a thousand pounds a year?" says Larry. "Go to!"
"The fact remains," says Pinckney, "that you have for an uncle the Earl of Kerrymull."
"And that I'm his best hated nephew, paid to keep out of his sight," comes back Larry.
"But you are where an Earl-uncle counts for most," suggests Pinckney. "By judicious choice of a father-in-law——"
"Rot!" breaks in Larry. "Am I a cheap adventurer in a third-rate melodrama? Waster I may be; but no dowry hunter."
"As though you could not like, for herself alone, any one of the half-dozen pretty girls who are foolish enough to be crazy over you," says Pinckney.
"As though I'd be blighter enough to let myself fall in love with any of the sweet dears!" says Larry. "I'm in my thirties, Man."