These various considerations, however, had little to do with the immense
inward anarchy that Mr. Prohack's tone had concealed as he musingly
murmured: "Do I really?" The disturbance was due almost exclusively to a
fierce imperial joy in the prospect of immediate wealth. The origin of
the wealth scarcely affected him. The associations of the wealth
scarcely affected him. He understood in a flash the deep wisdom of that
old proverb (whose truth he had often hitherto denied) that money has no
smell. Perhaps there might be forty good reasons against his accepting
the inheritance, but they were all ridiculous. Was he to abandon his
share of the money to Softly Bishop and the vampire-woman? Such a notion
was idiotic. It was contrary to the robust and matter-of-fact
commonsense which always marked his actions--if not his theories. No
more should his wife be compelled to scheme out painfully the employment
of her housekeeping allowance. Never again should there be a question
about a new frock for his daughter. He was conscious, before anything
else, of a triumphant protective and spoiling tenderness for his women.
He would be absurd with his women. He would ruin their characters with
kindness and with invitations to be capricious and exacting and
expensive and futile. They nobly deserved it. He wanted to shout and to
sing and to tell everybody that he would not in future stand any d----d
nonsense from anybody. He would have his way.

"Why!" thought he, pulling himself up. "I've developed all the
peculiarities of a millionaire in about a minute and a half."

And again, he cried to himself, in the vast and imperfectly explored
jungle that every man calls his heart:

"Ah! I could not have borne to give up either of my clubs! No! I was