"
Diana blushed as she remembered that Captain Paget had not been so
innocent of any design in this matter as the Frenchman imagined.
"And you will receive even papa for my sake?" asked Diana.
"With all my heart."
"Ah, you are indeed a generous lover!"
"A lover who is not generous is--bah! there is nothing in creation so
mean as the wretch whom love does not render generous. When one sees the
woman whom Fate intends for one's wife, is one to stop to inquire the
character of her father, her mother, her sister, her cousin?--for there
is no stopping when you begin that. A man who loves makes no inquiries.
If he finds his jewel in the gutter, he picks it out of the mud and
carries it away in his bosom, too proud of his treasure to remember where
he found it; always provided that the jewel is no counterfeit, but the
real gem, fit for a king's crown. And my diamond is of the purest water.
By-and-by we will try to drain the gutter--that is to say, we will try to
pay those small debts of which you speak, to lodging-house keepers, and
tradesmen who have trusted your father."
"You would pay papa's debts!" cried Diana in amazement.
"But why not? All these little debts, the thought of which is so bitter
to you, might be discharged for two or three thousand pounds. Your father
tells me I am to be very rich by-and-by."
"My father tells you! Ah, then, you have allowed him to involve you in
some kind of speculation!"
"He has involved me in no speculation, and in no risk that two or three
hundred pounds will not cover.
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