"Loan! what mockery! I will yield no further to your outrageous demands. I was a fool ever to have feared the little power you possess. Go, sir! I do not fear you."
"I want your check for two hundred dollars—no more," said Martin, in a modified tone—"I will not be hard on you. Necessity drives me to this resort; but I hope never to trouble you again."
"Not a dollar," replied Jasper, firmly. "And now, my friend, seek some other mode of sustaining yourself in vice and idleness. You have received from me your last contribution. In settling the estate of Reuben Elder to the entire satisfaction of all parties, I have disarmed you. You have no further power to hurt."
"You may find yourself mistaken in regard to my power," replied Martin as he made a movement toward the door, and threw back upon the merchant a side-glance of the keenest malignity. "Many a foot has been stung by the reptile it spurned."
The word "stay" came not to Jasper's lips. He was fully in earnest.
Martin paused, with his hand on the door, and said—
"One hundred dollars will do."
"Not a copper, if it were to save you from the nether regions!" cried Jasper, his anger and indignation o'erleaping the boundaries of self-control.
He was alone in the next moment. As his excitement cooled down, he felt by no means indifferent to the consequences which might follow this rupture with Martin. More than one thought presented itself, which, if it could have been weighed calmly a few minutes before, would have caused a slightly modified treatment of his unwelcome visitor.
But having taken his position, Jasper determined to adhere to it, and brave all consequences.
While Claire was yet seated at the breakfast-table on the next morning, word was brought that a gentleman was in the parlour and wished to see him.