"It is simply that I have no income on which to live."
"Have I not offered you money?"
"But, Madame Goesler, you who offer it would yourself despise me if I
took it."
"No;--I do deny it." As she said this,--not loudly but with much
emphasis,--she came and stood before him where he was sitting. And as
he looked at her he could perceive that there was a strength about
her of which he had not been aware. She was stronger, larger, more
robust physically than he had hitherto conceived. "I do deny it," she
said. "Money is neither god nor devil, that it should make one noble
and another vile. It is an accident, and, if honestly possessed, may
pass from you to me, or from me to you, without a stain. You may
take my dinner from me if I give it you, my flowers, my friendship,
my,--my,--my everything, but my money! Explain to me the cause of the
phenomenon. If I give to you a thousand pounds, now this moment, and
you take it, you are base;--but if I leave it you in my will,--and
die,--you take it, and are not base. Explain to me the cause of
that."
"You have not said it quite all," said Phineas hoarsely.
"What have I left unsaid? If I have left anything unsaid, do you say
the rest."
"It is because you are a woman, and young, and beautiful, that no man
may take wealth from your hands.
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