But the moment for the first lesson had come. “Your father has not written to you since you started?” he said.
“Not a line. He has not known our address. He is never very good at letter-writing. I did write to him from Paris, and I scribbled a few words to Everett yesterday.”
“It is very odd that he should never have written to me.”
“Did you expect him to write?”
“To tell you the truth, I rather did. Not that I should have dreamed of his corresponding with me had he spoken to me on a certain subject. But as, on that subject, he never opened his mouth to me, I almost thought he would write.”
“Do you mean about money?” she asked in a very low voice.
“Well;—yes; I do mean about money. Things hitherto have gone so very strangely between us. Sit down, dear, till we have a real domestic talk.”
“Tell me everything,” she said, as she nestled herself close to his side.
“You know how it was at first between him and me. He objected to me violently—I mean openly, to my face. But he based his objection solely on my nationality—nationality and blood. As to my condition in the world, fortune, or income, he never asked a word. That was strange.”
“I suppose he thought he knew.”
“He could not have thought he knew, dearest. But it was not for me to force the subject upon him. You can see that.”
“I am sure whatever you did was right, Ferdinand.”
“He is indisputably a rich man—one who might be supposed to be able and willing to give an only daughter a considerable fortune. Now I certainly had never thought of marrying for money.” Here she rubbed her face upon his arm. “I felt that it was not for me to speak of money. If he chose to be reticent, I could be so equally. Had he asked me, I should have told him that I had no fortune, but was making a large though precarious income. It would then be for him to declare what he intended to do. That would, I think, have been preferable. As it is we are all in doubt. In my position a knowledge of what your father intends to do would be most valuable to me.”
“Should you not ask him?”
“I believe there has always been a perfect confidence between you and him?”
“Certainly—as to all our ways of living. But he never said a word to me about money in his life.”
“And yet, my darling, money is most important.”
“Of course it is. I know that, Ferdinand.”
“Would you mind asking?” She did not answer him at once, but sat thinking. And he also paused before he went on with his lesson. But, in order that the lesson should be efficacious, it would be as well that he should tell her as much as he could even at this first lecture. “To tell you the truth, this is quite essential to me at present—very much more than I had thought it would be when we fixed the day for our marriage.” Her mind within her recoiled at this, though she was very careful that he should not feel any such motion in her body. “My business is precarious.”
“What is your business, Ferdinand?” Poor girl! That she should have been allowed to marry a man, and then have to ask such a question!
“It is generally commercial. I buy and sell on speculation. The world, which is shy of new words, has not yet given it a name. I am a good deal at present in the South American trade.” She listened, but received no glimmering of an idea from his words. “When we were engaged everything was as bright as roses with me.”
“Why did you not tell me this before—so that we might have been more prudent?”
“Such prudence would have been horrid to me. But the fact is that I should not now have spoken to you at all, but that since we left England I have had letters from a sort of partner of mine. In our business things will go astray sometimes. It would be of great service to me if I could learn what are your father’s intentions.”
“You want him to give you some money at once.”
“It would not be unusual, dear—when there is money to be given. But I want you specially to ask him what he himself would propose to
