“Well—you’re an idiot,” he said, very plainly. “You’ll never get on in the world if you’re tied to a woman’s shoe strings, depend upon it. Girls are the ruin of young men like you. When a man is free, he’s his own master, but as soon as he becomes the slave of a pretty face then he’s a lost soul both to himself and to those who employ him. Take the advice of an old man, Rolfe,” he added, not unkindly. “Cast off the trammels, and be free to go hither and thither. When I was your age, I believed in what men call love. Bah! Live as long as I have, and watch human nature as I have watched it, and you’ll come to the same conclusion as I have arrived at.”
“And what is that?” asked Rolfe, for such conversation was altogether unusual.
“That woman is man’s ruin always—that the more beautiful the woman the more complete the ruin,” he answered, in the hard, unsympathetic way which he sometimes did when he wished to emphasise a point.
Charlie Rolfe was silent. He was familiar with old Sam’s eccentricities, one of which was that he must never be contradicted. His amazing prosperity had induced an overbearing egotism. It was better to make no reply.
At heart the old man was beside himself with delight that his secretary had not left London, but it was his policy never to betray pleasure at anything. He seldom bestowed a single word of praise upon anyone. He was silent when satisfied, and bitterly sarcastic when not pleased.
“I do not think, sir, that whatever you may have heard concerning the lady in question is to her detriment,” he could not refrain from remarking.
“All that I have heard is very favourable, I admit. Understand that I say nothing against the lady. What I object to is the principle of a young man being in love. Why court unhappiness? You’ll meet with sufficient of it in the world, I can assure you. Look at me! Should I be what I am if I had saddled myself with a woman and her worries of society, frocks, children, petty jealousies, flirtations, and the thousand and one cares and annoyances which make a man’s life a burden to him.
“No. Take my advice, and let those fools who run after trouble go their own way. Sentimentalists may write screeds and poets sonnets, but you’ll find, my boy, that the only true friend you’ll have in life is your own pocket.”
Charlie was not in the humour to be lectured, and more especially upon his passionate devotion to Maud. He was annoyed that Statham should have found it out, and yet, knowing the wide-reaching sources of information possessed by the old millionaire, it was scarcely to be wondered at.
“Of course,” he admitted, somewhat impatiently, “there is a good deal of truth in your argument, even though it be a rather blunt one. Yet are not some men happy with the love of a good wife?”