A Barren Title: A Novel

by T. W. Speight

"Have my family no more respect for me than, out of an aggregate income of twenty thousand a year, to expect me to live on, and be satisfied with, a paltry six hundred? Are you aware, madam, that the Earl of Loughton's boots let water in, and that he hasn't enough money in his purse to pay for a pair of new ones?"

"So, sir, we are getting sit your motives by degrees. You threaten us with this marriage unless we agree to buy you off."

The earl laughed silently. "I threaten you with nothing I merely put before you a plain statement of facts, and leave you to draw what inference you please. Remember, pray, that it is you who have come to me and not I who have appealed to you. Take back your six hundred a year, madam, if it so please you; I shall not want for bread and cheese, I dare say."

For the first time since the discussion began, Mr. Flicker now spoke. "If I remember rightly, my lord, the amount of income suggested by you at our first meeting was twelve hundred a year--just double the sum you are now in receipt of? If the family, taking into consideration all the circumstances of the case, could see their way to fall in with your first suggestion, is there not a possibility that these disquieting rumors respecting a presumptive matrimonial alliance might prove to be without the slightest foundation in fact?"

"In other words, Flicker, would not a golden bullet bring down this canard at once and forever?"

The ghost of a smile flitted across the lawyer's hard-set face. "My meaning precisely, my lord."

"Well, golden bullets are wonderful things, and really, now I come to think of it, I shouldn't be surprised if, in the present case, one of them, properly aimed, were to have the effect hinted at by you."

The countess glowered at the lawyer as though she could scarcely believe the evidence of her ears. "Mr. Flicker," she said, in her most imperious way, "may I ask by whose authority you have dared even to hint at a course which, if carried out, would be a disgrace to everybody concerned?"

"My lord," said Mr. Flicker, turning to the earl, "may I take the liberty of asking to be permitted to have five minutes' private conversation with her ladyship?"

"Certainly, Flicker, certainly. I'll go and have a cigarette in the garden. Touch the bell and send the servant for me when you are ready." And with that the earl strolled leisurely out. As he was shutting the door he heard the countess say with much emphasis, "That man will be the death of me."