“I’ll tell you what it is, Lopez,” said Wharton, as they strolled out of the club together, a little after ten o’clock, “the men of the present day won’t give themselves the trouble to occupy their minds with matters which have, or should have, real interest. Pope knew all about it when he said that ‘The proper study of mankind is man.’ But people don’t read Pope now, or if they do they don’t take the trouble to understand him.”
“Men are too busy making money, my dear fellow.”
“That’s just it. Money’s a very nice thing.”
“Very nice,” said Lopez.
“But the search after it is debasing. If a man could make money for four, or six, or even eight hours a day, and then wash his mind of the pursuit, as a clerk in an office washes the copies and ledgers out of his mind, then—”
“He would never make money in that way—and keep it.”
“And therefore the whole thing is debasing. A man ceases to care for the great interests of the world, or even to be aware of their existence, when his whole soul is in Spanish bonds. They wanted to make a banker of me, but I found that it would kill me.”
“It would kill me, I think, if I had to confine myself to Spanish bonds.”
“You know what I mean. You at any rate can understand me, though I fear you are too far gone to abandon the idea of making a fortune.”
“I would abandon it tomorrow if I could come into a fortune ready made. A man must at any rate eat.”
“Yes;—he must eat. But I am not quite sure,” said Wharton thoughtfully, “that he need think about what he eats.”
“Unless the beef is sent up without horse radish!” It had happened that when the two men sat down to their dinner the insufficient quantity of that vegetable supplied by the steward of the club had been all consumed, and Wharton had complained of the grievance.
“A man has a right to that for which he has paid,” said Wharton, with mock solemnity, “and if he passes over laches of that nature without observation he does an injury to humanity at large. I’m not going to be caught in a trap, you know, because I like horse radish with my beef. Well, I can’t go farther out of my way, as I have a deal of reading to do before I court my Morpheus. If you’ll take my advice you’ll go straight to the governor. Whatever Emily may feel I don’t think she’ll say much to encourage you unless you go about it after that fashion. She has prim notions of her own, which perhaps are not after all so much amiss when a man wants to marry a girl.”
“God forbid that I should think that anything about your sister was amiss!”
“I don’t think there is much myself. Women are generally superficial—but some are honestly superficial and some dishonestly. Emily at any rate is honest.”
“Stop half a moment.” Then they sauntered arm in arm down the broad pavement leading from Pall Mall to the Duke of York’s column. “I wish I could make out your father more clearly. He is always civil to me, but he has a cold way of looking at me which makes me think I am not in his good books.”
“He is like that to everybody.”
“I never seem to get beyond the skin with him. You must have heard him speak of me in my absence?”
“He never says very much about anybody.”
“But a word would let me know how the land lies. You know me well enough to be aware that I am the last man to be curious as to what others think of me. Indeed I do not care about it as much as a man should do. I am utterly indifferent to the opinion of the world at large, and would never object to the company of a pleasant person because the pleasant person abused me behind my back. What I value is the pleasantness of the man and not his liking or disliking for myself. But here the dearest aim of my life is concerned, and I might be guided either this way or that, to my great advantage, by knowing whether I stand well or ill with him.”
“You have dined three times within the last three months in Manchester Square, and I don’t know any other man—certainly no other young man—who has had such strong proof of intimacy from my father.”
“Yes, and I know my advantages. But I have been there as your friend, not as his.”
“He doesn’t care twopence about my friends. I wanted to give Charlie Skate a dinner, but my father wouldn’t have him at any price.”
“Charlie Skate is out at elbows, and bets at billiards. I am respectable—or at any rate your father thinks so. Your father is more anxious about you than you are aware of, and wishes to make his house pleasant to you as long as he can do so to your advantage. As far as you are concerned he rather approves of me, fancying that my turn for making money is stronger than my turn for spending it. Nevertheless, he looks upon me as a friend of yours rather than his own. Though he has given
