“He might, perhaps, if I had money. But as it is----” “Ah, that want of money--that fatal, miserable want of money. That’s the pinch; yes, that’s always the pinch,” burst out Amos, with surprising energy. “How many a promising, brilliant young man--and yet not so brilliant as--well, as some I know, either--how many have been wrecked on that shoal! What might I not have done myself in the world, with the moderate abilities I have and with perseverance, if it had not been for that curse, want of money. Yes, there’s the rub.” There was a pause. The younger man was lost in thought, the elder was watching him. Rees woke out of his reverie with a start, and a laugh which was, perhaps, a shade less light-hearted than usual. “And after all,” he said, shrugging his shoulders and throwing his racquet high in the air, to catch it again as easily as if he had been born a conjuror, “I don’t know, when one comes to think of it, whether I would care about Lady Marion as a wife. She’s a good girl, but not the most graceful creature in the world. Why, I know a girl, one who doesn’t dislike me very furiously either, who has more beauty in the bend of her little finger than all the Ladies Cenarth have in their whole bodies.” Amos cast at him out of the corners of his eyes a brief glance instinct with venom. “I don’t suppose there are many girls about, high or low, who do dislike you very furiously, Mr. Pennant,” he said, in a tone of sly malice not altogether as pleasing as the words; “but I do earnestly hope, if I may presume to say so, that you will not destroy chances which I, an old experienced man, perceive to be great, for the sake of a pretty face in a rank of life beneath you.” “You may be quite sure that the girl I should choose for a wife would be beneath nobody, Goodhare,” said Rees, with haughtiness in which there was no offence. “But anyhow,” he added, with another laugh, “there’s time enough to think about that. I don’t mean to bestow upon any lady my name and my tennis racquet--all I possess--for the next ten years.” “Of course not. You mean to enjoy yourself.” Rees did not quite understand the significance of the elder man’s tone, but it rather grated on him. “Yes, I mean to enjoy myself in my own way,” he said, as he sprang up from the gate on which he had been sitting, and prepared to continue his walk. “Well, good night, Goodhare; I must be getting home.” “Good night, Mr. Pennant. I wish you’d come round to the library some evening and see an edition of Carlyle which I’ve just had rebound after my own taste. I’m rather proud of it. It won’t be very entertaining for you, but it will bring a ray of sunshine into my grey life, and show me that you are not offended by my frankness.” He had touched on the right chord again. The young fellow held out his hand and grasped that of the librarian warmly. “Of course I’ll come,” he said good humoredly. “Only you mustn’t butter me up so; it’ll turn my head.”