"Yes, yes, my boy--I quite understand." There was a pause. "She is far the most beautiful girl I ever saw," said Gerald at length. "I grant it." "She has also a beautiful disposition." "H'mph!" "Yes, it is so. Her birth being undeniable, and her beauty so great, I have been wondering whether--whether anything else that is within my reach could ever be as well worth having--could ever compensate me for her loss." "In short, my able, intellectual son is preparing to consider the world well lost for love--eh?" "I think, father, you will admit the temptation to do so in this case." "I do," was the answer, in tones abrupt but heartfelt. "I don't mind owning that, during the past fortnight, while seeing whither you were drifting, I have been half-inclined to drift also in that direction. But, my boy, it won't do." He laid his clenched hand heavily on the desk before him. "I tell you plainly that it won't do. The girl is beautiful, I don't deny it. But she comes of a bad stock. Her mother is a woman whom I should describe as having no moral sense. They are beggars. You would have bound upon your back, for the term of your natural life, a ready-made family of three, none of whom, I dare swear, will ever earn a farthing as long as they live. Just run your eye over that." With a sudden twisting gesture he pushed a note, on lavender paper with a tiny, narrow black border, and scented with orris root, towards where his son sat. Gerald read: Laburnum Villa, Wayhurst. _My dear, generous friend,_ _With your kindness to my Virginia already placing me under a burden of obligation to you, it must indeed seem to you that I stretch friendship to its utmost in writing to weary you with my troubles and to beseech advice. My excuses are, briefly, these: I know you to be an excellent man of business; and I know that you love my girl._ _I will try not to be tiresome, and, indeed, the story of my misfortune, though dire, will not take long to tell. My poor husband--who, alas! had not your gift for finance--mortgaged our dear home during his lifetime. At his death, the debts on the estate swallowed up almost all other available money. We were obliged to let Lissendean, and to live upon the rent paid. I am quite unused to business, having lived, till my sad widowhood, so sheltered a life, and I forgot that if the payments were not kept up--the interest on the mortgage--I should lose the house altogether. Believe me, in our straitened circumstances, it was impossible to keep up the payments. Only yesterday have I heard from my solicitor that the mortgagee has foreclosed, and that we are left as destitute as though my husband had been a crossing-sweeper._