"That is what all the men say. Why, you silly boy, if Phillis were to love you first, do you think a thousand men could make her give you up?"
"You are right: but she does not love me; she only likes me; she does not know what love means. That is bad enough to think of. But even that isn't the worst."
"What more is there?"
"I am so horribly, so abominably poor. My brother Isleworth is the poorest peer in the kingdom, and I am about the poorest younger son. And Colquhoun will think I am coming after Phillis's money."
"As you are poor, it will be a great comfort for everybody concerned," said Agatha, with good sense, "to think that, should you marry Phillis, she has some money to help you with. Go and see Lawrence Colquhoun, Mr. Dunquerque, and—and if I can help your cause, I will. There! Now let us have no more."
"They will make a pretty pair," said Mr. Gilead Beck presently to Mrs. L'Estrange.
"O Mr. Beck, you are all in a plot! And perhaps after all—and Mr. Dunquerque is so poor."
"Is that so?" Mr. Beck asked eagerly. "Will the young lady's guardian refuse the best man in the world because he is poor? No, Mrs. L'Estrange, there's only one way out of this muss, and perhaps you will take that way for me."
"What is it, Mr. Beck?"
"I can't say myself to Mr. Dunquerque, 'What is mine is yours.' And I can't say to Mr. Colquhoun—not with the delicacy that you would put into it—that Mr. Dunquerque shall have all I've got to make him happy. I want you to say that for me. Tell him there is no two ways about it—that Jack Dunquerque must marry Miss Fleming. Lord, Lord! why, they are made for each other! Look at him now, Mrs. L'Estrange, leanin' towards her, with a look half respectful and half hungry. And look at her, with her sweet innocent eyes; she doesn't understand it, she doesn't know what he's beatin' down with all his might: the strong honest love of a man—the best thing he's got to give. Wait till you give the word, and she feels his arms about her waist, and his lips close to hers. It's a beautiful thing, love. I've never been in love myself, but I've watched those that were; and I venture to tell you, Mrs. L'Estrange, that from the Queen down to the kitchen-maid, there isn't a woman among them all that isn't the better for being loved. And they know it, too, all of them, except that pretty creature."