The Argosy — page 166: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

156 Parkwater, answer for Miss May, it is all right. Do you give her a high salary, Bessie ?” “Oh no; very reasonable indeed. Only £40. But she is young, and has not been out before. I think she will suit, Frank: but of . course there’s no telling without a triaL—So Theodore has not come ‘ with you?” ‘“‘He will be here, I expect, in a few days. He was obliged to go _ on to London to see about one or two matters there ; pressing ones, - Bessie. Tody has been at the old game again. I don’t wonder your father 1s sick and tired of paying his debts for him.” “Poor fellow! He is so good-natured,” ‘*Not much of that. He is reckless-natured, if you like. To squander away his money, and leave his just debts unpaid, is not being what I call good-natured. From London, Tody goes down to see Sir Archibald: but as to his getting from him what he wants, I am sure he won't; and Tody knows it.” ‘Papa said, the last time, that he would never set him straight again,” observed Lady Tennygal. ‘“‘ The fact is, Bessie, he has said it so frequently, and Aad to say it so frequently, that it falls on Tody’s ears unheeded. But he got a sharp, determined letter from Sir Archibald the day before he left the yacht.” “Qh, did he? What did papa say in it?” ‘‘ Tt was to the effect that he would advance no more money ; and if Tody went to prison, there he might stop. Tody had been writing to Sir Archibald that he was in imminent danger of arrest.” ‘¢ What will he do? How I wish we were rich!” ‘If we were as nich as the Indies, and could hand Tody a blank cheque to be filled up at will, it would be doing him no kindness, for he is only pulled out of one scrape to walk into another. It will take Z£, 2,000 now to set him only tolerably clear.” ‘Oh, Frank! Do you know how he is going to manage ?” ‘I know what he says: but if Tody says one thing to-day, he says another to-morrow. He means, in the first place, to have a rake at Sir Archibald—that is not my expression, Bessie; it 1s his—and get him- self freed from one or two things that he must get himself freed from. So much, perhaps, Sir Archibald will do; for they are very bad.” ‘‘ What are they?” hastily inquired Lady Tennygal. ‘¢ My dear, I cannot explain them to you; you would not under- stand them. Tody is in a mess; and that’s all you need trouble yourself to know.” ‘¢ What has it to do with ?—this that 1s so bad ?” “Oh, it has to do with bills. Never you mind. He has been ina mess before, and he will be in one again, or else it would not be Tody Devereux. Sir Archibald, no doubt, will help him out of s4a#, but no CORNICE OOS (GO)