Читать книгу A Comedy of Elopement онлайн

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“I don’t think he will ruin yours,” said Aimée; “but poor Mr. Kyrle, what will he do?”

Fanny shook her head in a way to intimate that this gentleman’s prospects were dark indeed.

“He might have done very well,” she said, “but then, you see, he is impracticable, and that is what would make it such madness to marry him. His uncle told him frankly that he had not the faintest intention of leaving him a fortune, but that he would give him an opportunity to make one for himself. ‘I’ll give you a better start in life than I had,’ he said, ‘and if you don’t take advantage of it, that will be your fault.’ So he offered him a place in his business house, which, of course, meant the entire control and reversion of the business; and would you believe that Lennox declined the offer?”

“Why?” inquired Aimée, wisely refraining from any expression of opinion.

“Because he has no liking for commercial life—as if that had anything to do with it! He tried it for a while, then gave it up, saying he could not waste the best years of his life in work that he disliked. So he has gone into literature, and is connected with a newspaper. Conceive the difference! And fancy me dragging through life as the wife of a ‘special correspondent’!”