Chapter III. In Which Lizzie Descends From a Great Height - Page 2

covered with her hands. My clock shouted the seconds in the silence. Not a word was said for two or three minutes.

"'I have been brutal,' I says, by-an'-by. 'Forgive me.'

"'Mr. Potter,' she says, 'you've done me a great kindness. I'll never forget it. What shall I do?'

"'Well, for one thing,' says I, 'go back to your old simplicity an' live within your means.'

"'I'll do it,' she says; 'but--I--I supposed my father was rich. Oh, I wish we could have had this talk before!'

"'Did you know that Dan Pettigrew was in love with you?' I put it straight from the shoulder. 'He wouldn't dare tell ye, but you ought to know it. You are regarded as a kind of a queen here, an' it's customary for queens to be approached by ambassadors.'

"Her face lighted up.

"'In love with me?' she whispered. 'Why, Mr. Potter, I never dreamed of such a thing. Are you sure? How do you know? I thought he felt above me.'

"'An' he thought you felt above him,' I says.

"'How absurd! how unfortunate!' she whispered. 'I couldn't marry him now if he asked me. This thing has gone too far. I wouldn't treat any man that way.'

"'You are engaged to Alexander, are you?' I says.

"'Well, there is a sort of understanding, and I think we are to be married if--if--'

"She paused, and tears came to her eyes again.

"'You are thinking o' the money,' says I.

"'I am thinking o' the money,' says she. 'It has been promised to him. He will expect it.'

"'Do you think he is an honest man? Will he treat you well?'

"'I suppose so.'

"'Then let me talk with him. Perhaps he would take you without anything to boot.'

"'Please don't propose that,' says she. 'I think he's getting the worst of it now. Mr. Potter, would you lend me the money? I ask it because I don't want the family to be disgraced or Mr. Rolanoff to be badly treated. He is to invest the money in my name in a very promising venture. He says he can double it within three months.'

"It would have been easy for me to laugh, but I didn't. Lizzie's attitude in the whole matter pleased me. I saw that her heart was sound. I promised to have a talk with her father and see her again. I looked into his affairs carefully and put him on a new financial basis with a loan of fifteen thousand dollars.

"One day he came around to my office with Alexander an' wanted me to draw up a contract between him an' the young man. It was a rather crude proposition, an' I laughed, an' Aleck sat with a bored smile on his face.

"'Oh, if he's good enough for your daughter,' I said, 'his word ought to be good enough for you.'

"'That's all right,' says Sam, 'but business is business. I want it down in black an' white that the income from