"Miserable little Jew," muttered the fair dame he so pitilessly anatomized; "Geoffrey will kill him."
"Dowerless, yes; over head and ears in debt, possibly; but not without expectations," said Sir Geoffrey, displaying none of the anticipated fury. "You overlook the fact that she is the favorite granddaughter of Lady Drumloch, who, for all her miserly ways, I am credibly informed, is enormously wealthy."
"Oho!" cried the Jew, maliciously enjoying this display of a motive not altogether flattering to the unsuspected listener. "Your Honor is not quite so simple as I began to fear."
"Did you really think I was fool enough to leap before looking?" retorted Sir Geoffrey, with a fatuous laugh that set Prue's ears tingling. "To be sure, the wealth of Golconda could not add to the Lady Prue's charms, but in this wicked world one can not live on love, and as I have little else to offer, I rejoice, for her sake as well as my own, that she has a rich grandmother, who can not, it is to be hoped—I should say, lamented—live long to enjoy her hoards. They will, I am convinced, be put to excellent use by Lady Prudence Beaudesert."
"But how, if I could prove to you, Sir Geoffrey, that Lady Drumloch, instead of being a rich miser, is a very poor old woman, whose kinsman loans her a house to live in, and whose sole income is an annuity, from which she has—perhaps—saved enough to bury her? I know not who may have told you of this fabled wealth, but I am pretty sure it is not either of her granddaughters."
"Indeed, no," said Sir Geoffrey reflectively. "No such sordid subject has ever been broached between us. Yet I had it from a reliable source."
"Well, I advise you to make very sure of it, Sir Geoffrey; it will be no kindness, either to yourself or the Lady Prudence, to marry her without either of you having anything you can call your own—except your debts."
"'Tis true," muttered the baronet. "If I can not raise a thousand pounds—are Lady Prudence's debts so very great?"
"I do not betray the secrets of one client to another," said Aarons, with a sinister smile. "Even now I have acted against my own interests in my desire to befriend two headstrong young people. Nay, I would gladly go further, and find a rich wife for your Honor and a rich husband for the viscountess, if you would both listen to reason."
"Thanks, good Aarons," said Sir Geoffrey, moving toward the door; "I appreciate your good will at its full value. A rich wife—of your providing—to pay my debts, and a rich husband, on the same terms, for Lady Prudence, would make four fools for the benefit of one wise man."