JULIA.—The wretch!—don't speak of him!
TOUCHIT.—Ah! I am afraid he was a sad deceiver, that Editor. He was a very clever fellow. What droll songs he used to sing! What a heap of play-tickets, diorama-tickets, concert-tickets, he used to give you! Did he touch your heart, Julia?
JULIA.—Fiddlededee! No man ever touched my heart, Captain Touchit.
TOUCHIT.—What! not even Tom Flight, who had the second floor after the Editor left it—and who cried so bitterly at the idea of going out to India without you? You had a tendre for him—a little passion—you know you had. Why, even the ladies here know it. Mrs. Bonnington told me that you were waiting for a sweetheart in India to whom you were engaged; and Lady Kicklebury thinks you are dying in love for the absent swain.
JULIA.—I hope—I hope—you did not contradict them, Captain Touchit.
TOUCHIT.—Why not, my dear?
JULIA.—May I be frank with you? You were a kind, very kind friend to us—to me, in my youth.
TOUCHIT.—I paid my lodgings regularly, and my bills without asking questions. I never weighed the tea in the caddy, or counted the lumps of sugar, or heeded the rapid consumption of my liqueur—
JULIA.—Hush, hush! I know they were taken. I know you were very good to us. You helped my poor papa out of many a difficulty.
TOUCHIT [aside].—Tipsy old coal-merchant! I did, and he helped himself too.