'And then, Mr Giles, as you very well know, when I asked, if she has money, why don't she pay her debts? you replied, that she had paid them all. Upon which I said, I should be glad to know, then why I was to be the only person left out, just only for my complaisance in waiting so long? and upon that I resolved to come myself, and see how the matter stood. For though I have served you with such good will, Mrs Ellis, while I thought you poor, I must be a fool to be kept out of my money, when I know you have got it in plenty: and Mr Giles says that he counted, with his own hands, ten ten-pound bank-notes. Now I should be glad if you have no objection, to hear how you came by all that money, Mrs Ellis; for ten ten-pound bank-notes make a hundred pounds.' Oh! absent--unguarded--dangerous Mr Giles Arbe! thought Ellis, how much benevolence do you mar, by a distraction of mind that leads to so much mischief! 'I hope I have done nothing improper?' cried Mr Giles, perceiving, with concern, the disturbance of Ellis, 'in mentioning this; for I protest I never recollected, till this very minute, that the money is not your own. It slipt my memory, somehow, entirely.' 'Nay, nay, how will you make that out, Mr Giles?' cried Miss Bydel. 'If it were not her own, how came she to pay her tradesmen with it, as you told us that she did, Mr Giles?' Ellis, in the deepest embarrassment, knew not which way to turn her head. 'She paid them, Miss Bydel,' said Mr Giles, 'because she is too just, as well as too charitable, to let honest people want, only because they have the good nature to keep her from wanting herself; while she has such large sums, belonging to a rich friend, lying quite useless, in a bit of paper, by her side. For the money was left with her by a very rich friend, she told me herself.' 'No, Sir,--no, Mr Giles,' cried Ellis, hastily, and looking every way to avoid the anxious enquiring, quick-glancing eyes of Harleigh: 'I did not ... I could not say....' she stopt, scarcely knowing what she meant either to deny or to affirm. 'Yes, yes, 'twas a rich friend, my dear lady, you owned that. If you had not given me that assurance, I should not have urged you to make use of it. Besides, who but a rich friend would leave you money in such a way as that, neither locked, nor tied, nor in a box, nor in a parcel; but only in a little paper cover, directed For Miss Ellis, at her leisure?'