Brock had listened in utter amazement to the opening portion of this
ingenuous proposal. As the flexile youth progressed, amazement gave
place to indignation and then to disgust. Brock's brow grew dark; the
impulse to pull his countryman's nose was hard to overcome. Never in all
his life had he listened to such a frankly cold-blooded argument as that
put forth by the insufferable Knicker-bocker. In the end the big New
Yorker saw only the laughable side of the little New Yorker's plight.
After all, he was a harmless egoist, from whom no girl could expect much
in the way of recompense. It mattered little who the girl of the moment
might be, she could not hope to or even seek to hold his perambulatory
affections. "He's a single example of a great New York class," reflected
Brock. "The futile, priggish rich! There are thousands like him in my
dear New York--conscienceless, invertebrate, sybaritic sons of
idleness, college-bred and under-bred little beasts who can buy and then
cast off at their pleasure. They have no means of knowing how to fall in
love with a good girl. They have not been trained to it. It is not for
their scrambled intellects to discriminate between the chorus-girl brand
of attack and the subtle wooing of a gentlewoman. They can't
analyse--they can't feel! And this insipid, egotistical little bounder
is actually sitting there and asking me to help him with the girl I
love! Good Lord, what next?" He surveyed the eager Ulstervelt in the
most irritating manner, finally laughing outright in his face. The very
thought of him as Connie's accepted lover! She, the adorable, the
splendid, the unapproachable! It was excruciatingly funny!

"Oh, I say, old man," cried Freddie, when the disconcerting laugh came,
"don't laugh! It's no damned joke."

"'Pon my soul, Ulstervelt," apologised Brock, with a magnanimous smile,
"I haven't said it was a joke. You--"