n to treating with you. Please to give Sir Reginald
this paper: if he will but take the trouble to sign it, he may go to the
Falls of Niagara for me! I won't interrupt him--so he had better put pen
to paper, and get rid of me at once, for I know I am as welcome as snow
in harvest."

I took the paper, which was folded up, and gave it to Glanville, who
leant back on his chair, half-exhausted by his rage. He glanced his
eye over it, and then tore it into a thousand pieces, and trampled it
beneath his feet: "Go!" exclaimed he, "go, rascal, and do your worst! I
will not make myself a beggar to enrich you. My whole fortune would but
answer this demand."

"Do as you please, Sir Reginald," answered Thornton, grinning, "do as
you please. It's not a long walk from hence to Bow-street, nor a long
swing from Newgate to the gallows; do as you please, Sir Reginald, do as
you please!" and the villain flung himself at full length on the costly
ottoman, and eyed Glanville's countenance with an easy and malicious
effrontery, which seemed to say, "I know you will struggle, but you
cannot help yourself."

I took Glanville aside: "My dear friend," said I, "believe me, that I
share your indignation to the utmost; but we must do any thing rather
than incense this wretch: what is his demand?"

"I speak literally," replied Glanville, "when I say, that it covers
nearly the whole of my fortune; for my habits of extravagance have very
much curtailed my means: it is the exact sum I had set apart, for a
marriage gift to my sister, in addition to her own fortune."

"Then," said I, "you shall give it him; your sister has no longer any
necessity for a portion: her marriage with me prevents that--and with
regard to yourself, your wants are not many--such as it is, you can
share my fortune."

"No--no--no!" cried Glanville; and his generous nature lashing him into
fresh rage, he broke from my grasp, and moved menacingly to Thornton.
That person still lay on the ottoman, regarding us with an air half
contemptuous, half exulting.

"Leave the room instantly," said Glanville, "or you will repent it!"

"What! another murder, Sir Reginald!" said Thornton. "No, I am not a
sparrow, to have my neck wrenched by a woman's hand like your's. Give me
my demand--sign the paper, and I will leave you for ever and a day."

"I will commit no such folly," answered Glanville. "If you will accept
five thousand pounds, you shall have that sum; but were the rope on my