“It’s the money. Oh, Jenny, if you ever marry, marry a poor man, and then he can’t fling it in your face that you are poorer than he.”
“No; it can’t be the money, Nelly, for the money is his, and yet it hasn’t changed him. And, Nelly, isn’t it a good thing in a rich man not to turn his back on his old poor comrades—not to think because he has been in the sun that people are black who are only in the shade—not to pretend to have altered his skin because his coat has changed—isn’t it?”
“I see what you mean. You mean that I’ve driven my husband away with my bad temper.”
“No; not that; but Nelly—dear old Nell—think what you’re doing. Take warning from one who once made shipwreck of her own life. Think no man common who loves you—no matter what his ways are, or his manners, or his speech. Love makes the true nobility. It ennobles him who loves you and you who are beloved. Cling to it—prize it—do not throw it away. Money can not buy it, nor fame nor rank atone for it. When a woman is loved she is a queen, and he who loves her is her king.”
Mrs. Quiggin was weeping behind her hands by this time, but she lifted swollen eyes to say, “I see; you would have me go to him and submit, and explain, and beg his pardon. ‘Dear David, I didn’t marry you for your money——’ No,” leaping to her feet, “I’ll scrub my fingers to the bone first.”
“But, Nelly——”
“Say no more, Jenny Crow, We’re hot-headed people, both of us, and we’ll quarrel.”
Then Jenny’s solemn manner was gone in an instant. She snapped her fingers, kicked up one leg a little, and said lightly, “Very well; and now let us have some dinner,”——
Meantime Lovibond was hearing the other side of the story from Captain Davy at Forte Ann. On the way there he had heard of the separation from the boy, Willie Quarrie, a lugubrious Manx lad, eighteen years old, with a face as white as a haddock and as grim as a gannet.
“Aw, terr’ble doings, sir, terr’ble, terr’ble!” moaned Willie. “Young Mistress Quiggin ateing her heart out at Castle Mona, and Captain Davy hisself at Forte Ann over, drinking and tearing and carrying on till all’s blue.”