at length laid open the real object of their
visit.

'There he sits, Mr Bray,' said Ralph, as the invalid, not yet recovered
from his surprise, reclined in his chair, looking alternately at him
and Arthur Gride. 'What if he has had the ill-fortune to be one cause
of your detention in this place? I have been another; men must live; you
are too much a man of the world not to see that in its true light. We
offer the best reparation in our power. Reparation! Here is an offer
of marriage, that many a titled father would leap at, for his child. Mr
Arthur Gride, with the fortune of a prince. Think what a haul it is!'

'My daughter, sir,' returned Bray, haughtily, 'as I have brought her
up, would be a rich recompense for the largest fortune that a man could
bestow in exchange for her hand.'

'Precisely what I told you,' said the artful Ralph, turning to his
friend, old Arthur. 'Precisely what made me consider the thing so fair
and easy. There is no obligation on either side. You have money, and
Miss Madeline has beauty and worth. She has youth, you have money.
She has not money, you have not youth. Tit for tat, quits, a match of
Heaven's own making!'

'Matches are made in Heaven, they say,' added Arthur Gride, leering
hideously at the father-in-law he wanted. 'If we are married, it will be
destiny, according to that.'

'Then think, Mr Bray,' said Ralph, hastily substituting for this
argument considerations more nearly allied to earth, 'think what a stake
is involved in the acceptance or rejection of these proposals of my
friend.'

'How can I accept or reject,' interrupted Mr Bray, with an irritable
consciousness that it really rested with him to decide. 'It is for my
daughter to accept or reject; it is for my daughter. You know that.'

'True,' said Ralph, emphatically; 'but you have still the power to
advise; to state the reasons for and against; to hint a wish.'

'To hint a wish, sir!' returned the debtor, proud and mean by turns, and
selfish at all times. 'I am her father, am I not? Why should I hint, and
beat about the bush? Do you suppose, like her mother's friends and my
enemies--a curse upon them all!--that there is anything in what she has
done for me but duty, sir, but duty? Or do you think that my having been
unfortunate is a sufficient reason why our relative positions should
be changed, and that she should command and I should obey? Hint a wish,
too! Perhaps you think, because you see me in this place and