“The lowest terms, dear sir, on which you can provide your wife with those four steps at starting.  Double your present income—­the most rigid economy cannot do it in England on less.  You said just now that you expected greatly to increase the value of your business.  To work—­and increase it!  I am a good devil after all!  On the day when you satisfy me, by plain proofs, that your income has risen to three thousand a year, ask me for my niece’s hand, and it is yours.”

“May I inquire if you have mentioned this arrangement to Miss Obenreizer?”

“Certainly.  She has a last little morsel of regard still left for me, Mr. Vendale, which is not yours yet; and she accepts my terms.  In other words, she submits to be guided by her guardian’s regard for her welfare, and by her guardian’s superior knowledge of the world.”  He threw himself back in his chair, in firm reliance on his position, and in full possession of his excellent temper.

Any open assertion of his own interests, in the situation in which Vendale was now placed, seemed to be (for the present at least) hopeless.  He found himself literally left with no ground to stand on.  Whether Obenreizer’s objections were the genuine product of Obenreizer’s own view of the case, or whether he was simply delaying the marriage in the hope of ultimately breaking it off altogether—­in either of these events, any present resistance on Vendale’s part would be equally useless.  There was no help for it but to yield, making the best terms that he could on his own side.

“I protest against the conditions you impose on me,” he began.

“Naturally,” said Obenreizer; “I dare say I should protest, myself, in your place.”

“Say, however,” pursued Vendale, “that I accept your terms.  In that case, I must be permitted to make two stipulations on my part.  In the first place, I shall expect to be allowed to see your niece.”

“Aha! to see my niece? and to make her in as great a hurry to be married as you are yourself?  Suppose I say, No? you would see her perhaps without my permission?”

“Decidedly!”

“How delightfully frank!  How exquisitely English!  You shall see her, Mr. Vendale, on certain days, which we will appoint together.  What next?”

“Your objection to my income,” proceeded Vendale, “has taken me completely by surprise.  I wish to be assured against any repetition of that surprise.  Your present views of my qualification for marriage require me to have an income of three thousand a year.  Can I be certain, in the future, as your experience of England enlarges, that your estimate will rise no higher?”

“In plain English,” said Obenreizer, “you doubt my word?”

“Do you purpose to take my word for it when I inform you that I have doubled my income?” asked Vendale.  “If my memory does not deceive me, you stipulated, a minute since, for plain proofs?”