"What makes it so--so distressing, so heart-breaking, is that the whole of it has been through me--through me, whom he chose without a single penny--me, who had nothing more than poverty to bring him, poverty, and faith, and a very ordinary mind! And then, not content with that, I must do my best to rob him of every farthing of his noble fortune. Perhaps one of the wealthiest men in the world, until he set eyes upon unlucky me. Oh George, it will never be in your power to understand my pure contempt for money! Yet you ought not to rob anybody of it; and I have robbed the noblest man that ever lived of every penny, every penny!" "In the name of the forty thieves, and Morgiana, and the man they cut into four pieces, how can you have done all this?" I asked, being certain that there never was a girl more reasonable, yet remembering how the wisest of them love a little speculation. "To anybody but you, George, it would be too self-evident to require any explanation. Why will you drive me to a thing so painful? Do you mean to say that he does not love me?" "Better than his life, I believe; and better even than his money. But how does that bear upon the matter? They don't quote love upon the Stock Exchange." "Oh George! And you think you are a business man!" Grace smiled gloriously through her tears, possibly through her triumph over me, probably through the joy of my assurance. "Can anybody do two things at once? Could my Jack attend to ups and downs, keep his whole mind intent on Argentinas, contangoes, fundangoes, holdovers, and holdunders, and even unspeakable Turks with fifty wives, when the whole of his pure heart was down here? Why he only went up about once a-week, if he could get me to go out nutting with him." "Alas, I see. Neglected business. Left understrappers, and dashing young clerks, and trusty old codgers with pens behind their ears to stick to the stools, while he made sweet hay. But there must be something more than that."