E took me by a button of my coat, and pulled me round till his serious eyes were upon the level of my own. It was pretty clear he was disposed to convert me from my waggery; and though I had little enough stomach to play the confessor, there was something in his gravity that reduced me to attention.
'You are a man of much knowledge,' he said very soberly. 'I am but a tyro. Yet I would consider passion to be a common faculty of the race, identical at all times and in all conditions, nothing bettered by your superior wisdom, nothing cheapened by my scanty years. It is not upon the passion I would consult you; I would have your advice upon its conduct, which is a matter of experience.
'Will you hear nothing against your scheme?' I asked.
'I have no scheme,' said he; 'I have only a desire. It is you that shall devise me a scheme. As to the desire let us be silent; you and your knowledge have no concern with it.'
He was so single-minded in this silly fancy of his, and fronted me with so courteous a dignity, that I could not refrain a smile; he might have been issuing the ultimatum of a nation, and not the trumpery protest of love at five-and-twenty.
'Why,' said I, 'you put a heavy responsibility upon me. You ask me to give the whip to a beggar's horse. The devil is an intolerable fortune for so promising a lad.'
The determination slackened on his face, and his. eyes, relenting, took on a cast of fear lest I should take part against him.
'But you have seen her,' he said quickly. 'You admit her beauty. I shall meet no devil, I vow. She has grace and charm and loveliness and fascination. What further excellence would you have in her?'
I was in no mood to discuss his lady, but was thus driven to make good my case by an objection.
'These things are all one,' I said. 'Listen to the voice of a lover! We have said she comes of an inferior class. She is pretty; but she inspects the world from a very different corner. I doubt if your views overlap in any particular.'
'It is nothing against her,' he cried; 'mine shall go nearer hers'—(I shrugged my shoulders)—'or hers shall touch mine. Give me a start,' he said, 'and tell me of your abundant experience how she may be won.'
'She will have none of you?' I asked.
'She is so indifferent that she will barely recognise my presence,' said he.
I laughed. 'Put on your spurs; put on your spurs,' I said. 'You shall gallop if you will, though you should blaspheme for it later.'
'You have always been my friend,' he said, and snapped eagerly: 'how shall I start? Fit me with the boots, and you shall hear of me no more.'
'What sort of girl is this?' I asked with a chuckle.
It was a ridiculous question, I own, and started him upon a glib panegyric, which I interrupted with a gesture.
'And there is more to follow,' he said, eyeing me with a certain shame and a little reproach.
'God forbid!' I answered. 'We have already here the raw matter for a dozen angels. We do not desire to people Paradise, but to fashion one ninny of a woman for sober contemplation. With all this appreciation has she never a look for you?'
'Never a thought,' he returned promptly, 'and but idle looks.'
'Your wealth?' I asked.
'She is innocence itself,' he said, 'and my money weighs with her nothing. Besides, she has a passion for the romantic, and would contemn it.'
'A convenient passion,' I said, musing: 'the cleanest weapon in the world against a maid. If you should rescue her?'
He threw up his hands. 'Where is the possibility?' he demanded. 'Fires or bulls, rivers or thieves, runaway horses or libertines—I have prayed for them daily; but life is flat and unadventurous; and London is a city of damnable good order.'
'Disorder may be contrived,' I suggested.
'The trick is stale. I have purchased a man in his cups for the office,' he declared bitterly; 'I gave him a crown and the weight of my fist. It was a vain adventure.'
'It did not move her?' I asked.
'She turned to me very prettily with her thanks,' he said. 'O yes, I have her gratitude. But her gratitude!' He elevated his brows. 'She thinks I have an admirable muscle; but so have a dozen in her acquaintance.'
'You would not balk at a lie?' I asked.
'I would take any fence on the road to her,' he replied with ardour. 'If you have hope' He gazed at me inquiringly.