“Mary mentioned nothing else. But really,
Fred, I think you ought to be ashamed.”
“Oh, fudge! Don’t lecture me.
What did Mary say about it?”
“I am not obliged to tell you. You care
so very much what Mary says, and you are too rude
to allow me to speak.”
“Of course I care what Mary says. She
is the best girl I know.”
“I should never have thought she was a girl
to fall in love with.”
“How do you know what men would fall in love
with? Girls never know.”
“At least, Fred, let me advise you not
to fall in love with her, for she says she would not
marry you if you asked her.”
“She might have waited till I did ask her.”
“I knew it would nettle you, Fred.”
“Not at all. She would not have said so
if you had not provoked her.” Before reaching
home, Fred concluded that he would tell the whole
affair as simply as possible to his father, who might
perhaps take on himself the unpleasant business of
speaking to Bulstrode.
OLD AND YOUNG.
1st Gent. How class your man?—as
better than the most,
Or, seeming better, worse beneath
that cloak?
As saint or knave, pilgrim or hypocrite?
2d Gent. Nay, tell me how you class your
wealth of books
The drifted relics of all time.
As well sort them at once by size
and livery:
Vellum, tall copies, and the common
calf
Will hardly cover more diversity
Than all your labels cunningly devised
To class your unread authors.
In consequence of what he had heard from Fred, Mr.
Vincy determined to speak with Mr. Bulstrode in his
private room at the Bank at half-past one, when he
was usually free from other callers. But a visitor
had come in at one o’clock, and Mr. Bulstrode
had so much to say to him, that there was little chance
of the interview being over in half an hour.
The banker’s speech was fluent, but it was
also copious, and he used up an appreciable amount
of time in brief meditative pauses. Do not imagine
his sickly aspect to have been of the yellow, black-haired
sort: he had a pale blond skin, thin gray-besprinkled
brown hair, light-gray eyes, and a large forehead.
Loud men called his subdued tone an undertone, and
sometimes implied that it was inconsistent with openness;
though there seems to be no reason why a loud man should
not be given to concealment of anything except his
own voice, unless it can be shown that Holy Writ has
placed the seat of candor in the lungs. Mr. Bulstrode
had also a deferential bending attitude in listening,
and an apparently fixed attentiveness in his eyes which
made those persons who thought themselves worth hearing
infer that he was seeking the utmost improvement from
their discourse. Others, who expected to make
no great figure, disliked this kind of moral lantern
