“Oh, on purely business terms, of course,” said Jarvice.  He took a seat and resumed gaily.  “Now I am by profession—­what would you guess?  I am a money-lender.  Luckily for many people I have money, and I lend it—­I lend it upon very easy terms.  I make no secret of my calling, Mr. Hine.  On the contrary, I glory in it.  It gives me an opportunity of doing a great deal of good in a quiet way.  If I were to show you my books you would realize that many famous estates are only kept going through my assistance; and thus many a farm laborer owes his daily bread to me and never knows his debt.  Why should I conceal it?”

Mr. Jarvice turned toward his visitor with his hands outspread.  Then his voice dropped.

“There is only one thing I hide, and that, Mr. Hine, is the easiness of the terms on which I advance my loans.  I must hide that.  I should have all my profession against me were it known.  But you shall know it, Mr. Hine.”  He leaned forward and patted his young friend upon the knee with an air of great benevolence.  “Come, to business!  Your circumstances are not, I think, in a very flourishing condition.”

“I should think not,” said Walter Hine, sullenly.  “I have a hundred and fifty a year, paid weekly.  Three quid a week don’t give a fellow much chance of a flutter.”

“Three pounds a week.  Ridiculous!” cried Mr. Jarvice, lifting up his hands.  “I am shocked, really shocked.  But we will alter all that.  Oh yes, we will soon alter that.”

He sprang up briskly, and unlocking once more the drawer in which he kept his copy of the Code Napoleon, he took out this time a slip of paper.  He seated himself again, drawing up his chair to the table.

“Will you tell me, Mr. Hine, whether these particulars are correct?  We must be business-like, you know.  Oh yes,” he said, gaily wagging his head and cocking his bright little eyes at his visitor.  And he began to read aloud, or rather paraphrase, the paper which he held: 

“Your father inherited the same fortune as your uncle, Joseph Hine, but lost almost the entire amount in speculation.  In middle life he married your mother, who was—­forgive me if I wound the delicacy of your feelings, Mr. Hine—­not quite his equal in social position.  The happy couple then took up their residence in Arcade Street, Croydon, where you were born on March 6, twenty-three years ago.”

“Yes,” said Walter Hine.

“In Croydon you passed your boyhood.  You were sent to the public school there.  But the rigorous discipline of school life did not suit your independent character.”  Thus did Mr. Jarvice gracefully paraphrase the single word “expelled” which was written on his slip of paper.  “Ah, Mr. Hine,” he cried, smiling indulgently at the sullen, bemused weakling who sat before him, stale with his last night’s drink.  “You and Shelley!  Rebels, sir, rebels both!  Well, well!  After you left school, at the age of sixteen, you pursued your studies in a desultory fashion at home.  Your father died the following year.  Your mother two years later.  You have since lived in Russell Street, Bloomsbury, on the income which remained from your father’s patrimony.  Three pounds a week—­to be sure, here it is—­paid weekly by trustees appointed by your mother.  And you have adopted none of the liberal professions.  There we have it, I think.”