Kitabı oku: «The End of a Coil», sayfa 12
"You don't make much of a breakfast, father," Dolly observed.
"Never do," he returned. "No time to eat, when a man has just got up. A cup of coffee is the only thing. The French way is the best."
"You did not use to be up so late, in the old days."
"Don't think it's the best time either; but – you must do as the rest of the world do; swim with the – what is it? – swim with the current."
"How if the current goes the wrong way?"
"Can't help yourself; you must go along, if you are in it."
Dolly was silent, finishing her luncheon. She ate fast and hurriedly. Then she pushed her chair away and came round and sat upon her father's knee; laying one arm round his neck and looking into his face.
"Father," she said in her clear, musical voice, sweet as a bird's notes, – "father, suppose we get out of the current?"
"What current do you mean? It makes a great confusion to try to have your meals at a different hour from the rest of the world."
"I don't mean that, father."
"What have you come up to town for?"
"To see about it," said Dolly, with a smile that dimpled her cheeks most charmingly, and covered the anxiety she did not want to show.
"To see about what? Dolly, you are grown a woman."
"Yes, father."
"And, I declare you're a beautiful woman, child. It's time we were thinking of getting you married."
"You're not in a hurry, are you, father?"
"In a hurry!" said Mr. Copley, gazing at her admiringly. "Why, yes. I want you to be married while you can choose your place in the world, and enjoy it when you have got it. And you can choose now, Dolly."
"What, sir?"
"Your husband."
"But, father," cried Dolly, while her cheeks covered themselves with the most brilliant roses, "I cannot choose what is not presented to my choice!"
"No, child; take what is. That's what I am thinking of. Good enough too. Don't you like the ticket you have drawn?"
"Father," said Dolly, turning the tables now on her side, and laying her face in his neck, "I wish you would have nothing to do with lotteries or gaming!"
"I have nothing to do with lotteries, child."
"But with gaming?"
"What put such a thing into your head?"
Dolly hesitated, strained him a little closer in her embrace, and did not answer directly.
"Father, I wish you would!"
"What folly are you talking, Dolly?" said Mr. Copley angrily. "You are meddling with what you do not understand."
But Dolly only clung closer, and having once broken the ice would not now give back. She must speak now.
"Father," she said, half sobbing, yet commanding the sobs down, "we are getting ruined. We are losing each other. Mother and I live alone – we do not see you – we are poor – we have not money to pay our dues – mother is not getting better – and I am breaking my heart about her, and about you. O father, let us come and live together again."
Dolly got no answer to this outburst, and hardly was conscious that she got none, she was so eagerly trying to swallow down the emotion which threatened to master her voice. Mr. Copley had no answer ready.
"Father," Dolly began again, "mother wants to travel; she wants to go to Venice. Suppose we go?"
"Can't travel without money, Dolly. You say we haven't any."
"Would it cost more to travel than to live as we are living?"
"You say we cannot do that."
"Father, do you say so?"
"I am merely repeating your statements, Dolly, to show you how like a child you talk."
"Answer me as if I were a child then, father, and tell me what we can do. But don't let us go on living as we are doing!"
"I thought I had done the very best thing possible for your mother, when I got her that place down at – I forget what's the name of the place."
"Brierley."
"I thought I had done the very best thing for her, when I settled her there. Now she is tired of it."
"But father, we cannot pay our way; and it worries her."
"She is always worrying about something or other. If it wasn't that, it would be something else. Any man may be straightened for cash now and then. It happens to everybody. It is nothing to make a fuss about."
"But, father, if I cannot pay the servants, they must be without cash too; and that is hard on poor people."
"Not half so hard as on people above them," replied her father hastily. "They have ways and means; and they don't have a tenth or a hundredth as many wants, anyhow."
"But those they have are wants of necessary things," urged Dolly.
"Well, what do you want me to do?" said Mr. Copley, with as much of harshness in his manner as ever could come out towards Dolly. "I cannot coin money for you, well as I would like to do it."
"Father, let us take what we have got, and go to Venice! all together. We'll travel ever so cheaply and live ever so plainly; only let us go! Only let us go!"
"Think your mother'd like travelling second-class?" said Mr. Copley in the same way.
"She wouldn't mind so very much; and I wouldn't mind it at all. If we could only go."
"And what is to become of my business?"
Dolly did not dare give the answer that rose to her tongue, nor let her father know how much she knew. She came up on another side of the subject, and insisted that the consulate might be dispensed with. Mr. Copley did not need the office and might well be tired of it by this time. Dolly pleaded, and her father heard her with a half embarrassed, half sullen face; feeling her affectionate entreaties more than was at all convenient, and conscious at the same time of a whole side of his life that he would be ashamed his daughter should know; and afraid of her guessing it. Alas, for father and child both, when such a state of things comes about!
"Come, father!" said Dolly at last, touching her forehead to his forehead in a sweet kind of caress, – "I want you."
"Suppose I find somebody else to go with you instead of me?"
"Nobody else will do. Come, father! Do come."
"You might set off with Lawrence," said Mr. Copley as if considering, "and I might join you afterwards; at Venice, perhaps, or Nice, or somewhere. Hey?"
"That won't do. I would not go with Mr. Lawrence."
"Why not?"
"Too much of an honour for him."
"You need not be afraid of showing him too much honour, for he is willing to give you the greatest man can give to a woman."
Dolly coloured again, and again touched her forehead to her father's forehead and sat so, leaning against him. Maybe with an instinct of hiding her cheeks.
"Father, let us go to Venice!" she began again, leaving Mr. St. Leger. "Just think what fun it would be, to go all together. We have been living so long without you. I believe it would just make mother up. Think of seeing Venice together, father! – and then maybe we would go on to Geneva and get a look at Mont Blanc."
"Geneva is a place for lovers," said Mr. Copley.
"Why?"
"Romantic."
"Can't anybody else be romantic, except that sort of people? I am romantic, – and I do not care a straw about anybody but mother and you."
"Don't tell Mr. St. Leger that."
"He might as well know it. Come, father! Say you'll go."
It was hard to withstand her. The pure, gentle intonations rang upon Mr. Copley's soul almost like bells of doom, because he did withstand her. She was his saving good angel; he half knew it; he was ashamed before his child, and conscience knocked hard at the door of his heart; but the very shame he felt before her made her presence irksome to him, while yet it was, oh, so sweet! Alas, "he that doeth evil hateth the light." He was entangled in more than one sort of net, and he lacked moral power to break the meshes. The gentle fingers that were busy with the net, trying to unloose it, were a reproach and a torment to him. She must marry St. Leger; so his thoughts ran; it was the best thing that could happen to her; it was the best he could do for her. Then she would be secure, at all events.
"Dolly, why don't you like Lawrence?" he began.
"He's too handsome, father, – for one thing."
"I never heard of such a reason for a lady's dislike. That's play, Dolly."
"And he knows it; there's another thing."
"Well, of course he knows it. How can he help knowing it?"
"And he's too rich."
"Dolly, you are talking nonsense."
"And he knows that."
"He doesn't know he's too rich," said Mr. Copley, with a little bitterness. "No St. Leger ever did that."
"Well, father, that's what he is. Very handsome, and very rich. He is nothing else. He would suit some people admirably; but he don't suit me."
"What sort of thing would suit you?"
"A very perverse sort of a person, who is called Frank Collinshaw Copley."
"Well, you've got me," said her father, laughing a little at her. He could not help it. "You want something else besides."
"I don't, father, indeed."
"And, my child, money is necessary in this world. You cannot get along without money."
"Father, will you come to Venice? and we'll get along with very little money. Father, we must go, for mother. The doctor says so, and she is just longing to go. We ought to go as soon as ever you can be ready."
"You show how much you know about it, when you talk of Venice and a little money! You had better take Mr. St. Leger."
"Father, everybody says living is cheap in Switzerland."
"You talked of Venice."
"And Italy. The doctor says mother ought to stay some time at Nice, or Naples. Father, you can arrange it. Do! Give up the consulate, and let us take mother to Italy; and then home if you like. I don't much care, so that we have you." And again Dolly's forehead bent over to give a soft impact to her father's brown brow.
"Who did you come to town with?" he said suddenly. She told him.
"Well, now you had better go back with her, and I will see what I can do."
"You will go, father?"
"If I cannot immediately, I will send you and come on after."
"I cannot go without you, father. Oh, come, come!" And Dolly rained kisses upon his face, and stroked his forehead and cheeks, and was so entirely delicious in her tenderness and her sweetness, her love and her anxiety, that the heart of ordinary man could not stand it. Anything else became more easy than to refuse her. So Mr. Copley said he would go; and received a new harvest of caresses in reward, not wholly characterised by the usual drought of harvest-time, for some drops of joy and thankfulness still came falling, a sunlit shower.
"Now, my child," said her father, "you had better go back to your good housekeeper, and then back to your mother, and get all things ready for a start."
"Father, I can stay here to-night, can't I?"
Mr. Copley was not sure that he wanted her; yet he could not refuse to make inquiry. There was no difficulty; plenty of room; and Dolly joyously prepared herself to gather in the fruits of her victory, through that following care and those measures of security for want of which many a victory has been won in vain. Mrs. Jersey had long since been informed that she need not wait, and had driven away. Dolly now sent for her portmanteau, and established herself in her father's sitting room.
Mr. Copley looked on, helplessly; half delighted, half bored. He would not have chosen to have Dolly there just then; yet being there she was one of the most lovely visions that a father's eye could rest upon. Grown to be a woman – yes, she was; ordering and arranging things with a woman's wisdom and skill; ordering him, Mr. Copley felt with a queer sensation; and yet, so simple and free and sweet in all her words and ways as might have become seven instead of seventeen. St. Leger might be glad if he could get her! Yet she was inconvenient to Mr. Copley. She stood in his way, like the angel in Balaam's; only not with a sword drawn, but with loving looks, and kisses, and graces, and wiles of affection; and who could withstand an angel? He gave up trying; he let her have her way; and when dinner time came, Dolly and he had an almost jovial dinner. Until Mr. Copley rose from table, unlocked a cupboard, and took out a bottle of wine. Dolly's heart gave a sudden leap that meant a throe of pain. Was there another fight to be fought? How should she fight another fight? But the emergency pressed her.
"O father," she cried, "is that sherry?"
"No, it is better," said her father – pouring out a glass, – "it is Madeira."
Dolly saw the hand tremble that grasped the bottle, and she sprang up. She went round to her father, fell down on her knees before him, and laid one hand on the hand that had just seized the glass, the other on his shoulder.
"Please, father, don't take it! please don't take it!" she said in imploring tones. Mr. Copley paused.
"Not take it? Why not?" said he.
"It is not good for you. I know you ought not to take it, father. Please, please, don't!"
Dolly's eagerness and distress were too visible to be disregarded, by Mr. Copley at least. Her hand was trembling too. His still held the glass, but he looked uncertainly at Dolly, and asked her why it should not be good for him? Every gentleman in the land drank wine – that could afford it.
"But, father," said Dolly, "can you afford it?"
"Yes," said Mr. Copley. "Get up, Dolly. Here is the wine; it costs no more to drink it than to let it alone." And he swallowed the wine in the glass at a single draught.
"O father, don't take any more!" cried Dolly, seeing a preparatory movement of the hand towards the bottle. "O father! don't, don't! One glass is enough. Don't take any more to-day!"
"You talk like a goose, Dolly," said Mr. Copley, filling his glass. "I feel better already for that. It has done me good."
"You only think so. It is not doing you good. O father! if you love me, put the bottle away. Don't take a drop more!"
Dolly had turned pale in her agony of pleading; and her father, conscious in part, and ashamed with that secret consciousness, and taken by surprise at her action, looked at her and – did not drink.
"What's the matter with you, child?" he said, trying for an unconcerned manner. "Why should not I take wine, like everybody else in the world?"
"Father, it isn't good for people."
"I beg your pardon; it is very good for me. Indeed, I cannot be well without it."
"That's the very thing, father; people cannot do without it; and then it comes to be the master; and then – they cannot help themselves. Oh, do let it alone!"
"What's the matter, Dolly?" Mr. Copley repeated with an air of injury, which was at the same time miserably marred by embarrassment. "Do you think I cannot help myself? or how am I different from every other gentleman who takes wine?"
"Father, a great many of them are ruined by it."
"Well, I am not ruined by it yet."
"Father, how can you tell what might be? Father, I can't bear it!" Dolly could not indeed; she broke down. She sat on the floor and sobbed.
If Mr. Copley could have been angry with her; but he could not, she was so sweet in every pleading look and tone. If he could have dismissed her pleading as the whimsy of a fool; but he could not, for he knew it was wise truth. If he had been further gone in the habit which was growing upon him, to the point of brutality; but he was not yet; he was a man of affectionate nature. So he did not get angry, and though he wished Dolly at Brierley instead of in his room, he could not let her break her heart, seeing that she was there. He looked at her in uncomfortable silence for a minute or two; and then the bitterness of Dolly's sobs was more than he could stand. He rose and put the bottle away, locked it up, and came back to his place. Dolly's distress hindered her knowing what he had done.
"It's gone," Mr. Copley said in an injured tone, as of one oppressed and persecuted. "It is put away, Dolly; you need not sit there any longer."
Dolly looked up, rose from the floor, came into her father's arms, laid her two arms about his neck and her weary head upon his shoulder. It was a soft little head, and the action was like a child. Mr. Copley clasped her tenderly.
"Dolly," he said, – "my child – you are giving yourself a great deal more trouble than you need."
Dolly murmured, "Thank you, father!"
"You mustn't be superstitious."
Alas! Dolly had seen his face already altered by the indulgence of his new habits. Involuntarily her arms pressed him closer, and she only by an effort prevented a new outbreak of bitter sorrow. That was not best just now. She put a force upon herself; after a while looked up, and kissed her father; kissed him again and again.
"I declare!" said Mr. Copley, half delighted and half conscience-stricken, "you are a little witch, Dolly. Is this the way you are going to rule other folks beside me? Mr. St. Leger, for instance?"
"Mercy, father! no," said Dolly, recoiling.
"I don't believe he would be hard to manage. He's desperately in love with you, Dolly."
"Father, I don't want to manage. And I don't think Lawrence is in any danger. It isn't in him to be desperate about anything."
"So much the better, I think," said her father. "What if he should want to go with us to Venice?"
"Don't let him! We do not want him."
"He would be useful, I daresay. And I should have to take my secretary, Dolly."
"Take that other fellow, the one I saw in your office to-day."
"What, Babbage? He's a raw article, Dolly, very raw. I put him there to answer questions. The fellow was in a forlorn state here with nothing to do."
They calmed down after a while; and the rest of the evening was largely spent in considering plans and details of their projected movements. It was agreed that Dolly should rejoin Mrs. Jersey the next day, to be ready to return to Brierley with her; that then all preparations should be made for a speedy start to the Continent. Father and daughter talked themselves into ordinary composure, and when they had bid each other good night, Dolly went to rest with a feeling of some hopefulness.
CHAPTER XVII
RUPERT
Mrs. Jersey could not leave town the next day. Dolly had to wait. It was hard waiting. She half wished she had stayed that day also with her father; yet when she asked herself why? – she shuddered. To take care of him? to watch and keep guard over him? What use, for one day, when she could do it no longer? Mr. Copley must be left to himself; and a feeling of helplessness stole over her. From the momentary encouragement and hope, she fell back again to take a more comprehensive view of the subject; she saw that all was not gained yet, and it might be that nothing! And she could do no more, except pray. Poor Dolly did that; but the strain of fear, the horror of shame, the grief of hurt affection, began to make her very sore. She was not getting accustomed to her burden; it was growing more insupportably galling; the only hope for the whole family lay in getting together and remaining together, and in this journey taking Mr. Copley away from his haunts and his tempters. Yet Dolly reflected with trembling that the temptation, both temptations, would meet them on their way; if a man desired to drink or to play, he would never be at a loss for the opportunity or the companions. Dolly wrung her hands and prayed again.
However, something was gained; and Dolly on her return reported to her mother that they were to set off for the Continent in a few days. She brought down money, moreover, to pay off the servants; and with a heart so far lightened, went bravely at the preparations to be made.
"And will your father go with us to Venice?"
"Of course, mother. We cannot go without him."
"What if Venice shouldn't agree with me?"
"Oh, then we'll go on further. I think Naples would agree with you. There is a very nice house at Sorrento – nice people – where Lady Brierley spent a summer; and Mrs. Jersey has given me the address. Perhaps we'll go there."
"But if Lady Brierley was there, I guess it's an expensive place."
"No, Mrs. Jersey says not. You must have what you want anyhow, mother dear."
"I always used," said poor Mrs. Copley; "but of late I have been obliged to sing another tune."
"Go back to the old tune, then, dear. If father hasn't got the money, I'll find some way of raising it myself. I mean you shall go to Sorrento. Mrs. Jersey says it's just charming there."
"I wonder what she knows about it! A housekeeper! Queer person to tell you and me where to go."
"Why, a finger-post can do that, mother. Mrs. Jersey knows a great deal besides, about a great many things."
"Well!" Mrs. Copley said again with another sigh – "it is new times to me altogether. And I wish the old times would come back!"
"Perhaps they will, mother. When once we get hold of father again, we must try to charm him into staying with us."
And it seemed to Dolly that they might do so much. The spirit of seventeen is not easily kept down; and with the stir of actually getting ready for the journey, she felt her hope and courage moving also. A change at any rate was before her; and Dolly had a faint, far-off thought of possibly working upon her father to induce him at the close of their Italian journey to take ship for home.
So she bustled about from morning till night; packed what was to go and what was to be left; grew very cheery over her work, and cheered and amused her mother. September was on its way now; it was time to be off; and Dolly wrote to her father to tell him she was ready.
A few days later, Dolly was in the porch resting and eating a fine pear, which came out of a basket Mrs. Jersey had sent. It was afternoon, sunny and hazy, the air fragrant from the woods, the silence now and then emphasised by a shot somewhere in the distance. Dolly was happy and hopeful; the weather was most lovely, the pear was excellent; she was having a pleasant half hour of musing and anticipation. Somebody came on foot along the road, swung open the small lattice gate, and advanced up the path towards her.
Who was it? Not Mr. St. Leger, which had been Dolly's first momentary fear. No, this was a different creature. A young man, but how unlike that other. St. Leger was trim-built, smooth, regular, comely; this young fellow was lank, long-limbed, none of his joints played symmetrically with the others; and the face, though shrewd enough and good-natured, had no remote pretensions to beauty. His dress had not been cut by the sort of tailor that worked for the St. Legers; his gait, instead of the firm, compact, confident movement which Dolly was accustomed to see, had a swinging stride, which indeed did not lack a kind of confidence; the kind that makes no doubt of getting over the ground, and cares little for obstacles. As Dolly looked, she thought she had seen him before. But it was very odd, nevertheless, the sort of well-pleased smile his face wore. He took off his hat when he got to the foot of the steps, and stood there looking up at Dolly in the porch.
"You don't recollect me, I guess," said he.
"No," said Dolly gravely.
"I am Rupert Babbage. And that don't make you much wiser, does it?"
"No," said Dolly. "Not at all."
"Likely. But Mr. Copley has sent me down."
"Has he?"
"I recollect you first-rate," the stranger went on, feeling in his coat pocket for something and producing therefrom a letter. "Don't you know the day you came to your father's office?" And mounting a step or two, without further preface he handed the letter to Dolly. Dolly saw her father's handwriting, her own name on the cover, and put a stop to the wonder which was creeping over her, by breaking the seal. While she read the letter the young man's eyes read her face.
"DEAR DOLLY, —
"I can't get quit of this confounded Babel yet – and you must want somebody badly. So I send Rupert down. He'll do everything you want, better in fact than I could, for he is young and spry, and as good a boy as lives. He will see to everything, and you can get off as soon as you like. I think he had better go along all the way; his mother wit is worth a dozen stupid couriers, even though he don't know quite so much about routes and hotels; he will soon pick all that up. Will you want to stay more than a night in town? For that night my landlady can take you in; and if you let me know when you will be ready I will have your passage taken in the packet.
"Hurried, as always, dear Dolly, with my love to your mother,
"F. C. COPLEY,
"CONSUL'S OFFICE LONDON,
"Sept. 9, 182-."
Poor Dolly read this note over and over, having thrown away the remainder of her sweet pear as belonging only to a time of easy pleasure-taking which was past. Was her father not coming to Brierley then? she must get off without him? Why? And "your passage"! why not "our" passage? Dolly felt the ground giving way under her feet. No, her father could not be coming to Brierley, or he would not have sent this young fellow. And all things in the world were hovering in uncertainty; nothing sure even to hope.
The eyes that watched her saw the face change, the fair, bright, young face; saw her colour pale, and the lovely lines of the lips droop for a moment to an expression of great sadness. The eyelids drooped too, and he was sure there was a glistening under them.
"Did Mr. Copley say why he could not come?" she asked at length, lifting her head.
"He did not. I am very sorry!" said Rupert involuntarily. "I guess he could not get his business fixed. And he said you were in a hurry."
But not without him! thought Dolly. What was the whole movement for, if he were to be left out of it? What should she do? But she must not let the tears come. That would do nobody any good, not even herself. She brushed away the undue moisture, and raised her head.
"Did Mr. Copley tell you who I am?" the young man asked. "I guess he didn't forget that."
"No. Yes!" said Dolly, unable to help smiling at the question and the simple earnestness of the questioner's face. "He told me your name."
"Left you to find out the rest?" said he. "Well, what can I do first? That's what for I'm come."
"I don't think there is anything to do," said Dolly.
"All ready?"
"Yes. Pretty much. All except finishing."
"Lots o' baggage?"
"No, not so very much. We did not bring a great deal down here."
"Then it'll go by the coach easy enough. How will it get to the coach?"
"I don't know. We must have a waggon from the village, I suppose, or from some farmhouse."
"When do you want to go? and I'll soon fix that."
Dolly reflected and said, "The day after to-morrow."
"All right."
He was setting forth immediately, with a world of energy in his gait. Dolly called after him.
"To-morrow will be time enough for the waggon, Mr. Babbage."
"There'll be something else for to-morrow," he answered without pausing.
"Tea'll be ready at six," said Dolly, raising her voice a little.
"All right!" said he, and sped away.
Dolly looked after him, so full of vexation that she did not know what to do. Not her father, and in his place this boy! This boy to go with them on the journey; to be one of the party; to be always on hand; for he could not be relegated to the place of a servant or a courier. And Dolly wanted her father, and was sure that the expense of a fourth person might have been spared. The worst fear of all she would not look at; it was possible that they were still to be three, and her father, the fourth, left out. However, for the present the matter in hand was action; she must tell her mother about this new arrival before she met him at supper. Dolly went in.
"Your father not coming?" said Mrs. Copley when she had heard Dolly's report. "Then we have nothing to wait for, and we can get right off. I do want to see your father out of that miserable office once!"
"Well, he promised me, mother," said Dolly, sighing.
"Can we go to-morrow?"
"No, mother; there are too many last things to do. Next day we will."
"Why can't we go and leave this young man to finish up after us?"
"He could not do it, mother; and we must let father know, besides."
Rupert came back in due time and was presented to Mrs. Copley; but Mrs. Copley did not admire his looks, and the supper-table party was very silent. The silence became unbearable to the new-comer; and though he was not without a certain shyness in Dolly's presence, it became at last easier to speak than to go on eating and not speaking.
"Plenty of shootin' round about here, I s'pose," he remarked. "I heard the guns going."
"The preserves of Brierley are very full of game," Dolly answered; "and there are some friends of Lord Brierley staying at the house."
"I engaged a waggon," Rupert went on. "It'll be here at one, sharp."
"I ought to have sent a word to the post-office, for father, when you went to the village; but I did not think till it was too late."
"I did that," said Rupert.
"Sent a word to father?"
"All right. Told him you'd be up on Wednesday."
"Oh, thank you. That was very thoughtful."
"You're from America," said Mrs. Copley.
"Should think I was!"
"Whereabouts? where from, I mean?"
"About two miles from your place – Ortonville is the spot. My native."
"What made you come over here?"
"Well, I s'pose it would be as true as anything to say, Mr. Copley made me come."
"What for?"
"Well, I guess it was kindness. Most likely."
"Kindness!" echoed Mrs. Copley. "Poor kindness, I call it, to take a man, or a boy, or any one else, away from his natural home. Haven't you found it so? Don't you wish you were back there again?"
"Well," said Rupert with a little slowness, and a twinkle in his eye at the same time, – "I just don't; if I'm to tell the truth."
"It is incomprehensible to me!" returned the lady. "Why, what do you find here, that you would not have had at home?"
"England, for one thing," said the young man with a smile.
"England! Of course you would not have had England at home; but isn't America better?"
"I think it is."
"Then what do you gain by exchanging one for the other?" said Mrs. Copley with heat.
"That exchange ain't made yet. I calculate to go back, when I have got all I want on this side."
"And what do you want? Money, I suppose. Everything is for money, with everybody. Country, and family, and the ease of life, and the pleasure of being together – nothing matters, if only one may get money! I don't know but savages have the best of it. At least they don't live for money."
Mrs. Copley forgot at the moment that she was wishing her daughter to marry for money.
"I counsel you, young man," she began again. "Money won't buy everything."
