"No—that is strange—yet scarcely strange; for, when we last met, his head was full of other things—love and marriage. Basta! youth will be youth."
"He has no youth left in him!" exclaimed Harley, passionately. "I doubt if he ever had any. He is one of those men who come into the world with the pulse of a centenarian. You and I never shall be as old—as he was in long-clothes. Ah, you may laugh; but I am never wrong in my instincts. I disliked him at the first—his eye, his smile, his voice, his very footstep. It is madness in you to countenance such a marriage: it may destroy all chance of your restoration."
"Better that than infringe my word once passed."
"No, no," exclaimed Harley; "your word is not passed—it shall not be passed. Nay, never look so piteously at me. At all events, pause till we know more of this young man. If he be worthy of her without a dower, why, then, let him lose you your heritage. I should have no more to say."
"But why lose me my heritage!"
"Do you think the Austrian government would suffer your estates to pass to this English jackanapes, a clerk in a public office? Oh, sage in theory, why are you such a simpleton in action!"
othing moved by this taunt, Riccabocca rubbed his hands, and then stretched them comfortably over the fire.
"My friend," said he, "the heritage would pass to my son—a dowry only goes to the daughter."
"But you have no son."
"Hush! I am going to have one; my Jemima informed me of it yesterday morning; and it was upon that information that I resolved to speak to Leslie. Am I a simpleton now?"