Mr. Losely tossed off two fresh glasses of brandy, one after the other,
and, rising, walked to and fro the room, his hands buried in his pockets,
and in no comfortable vein of reflection. At length he paused and said,
"Well, upon the whole, I don't see what I could do with the girl just at
present, though, of course, I ought to know where she is, and with whom.
Tell me, Mrs. Crane, what is she like,--pretty or plain?"

"I suppose the chit would be called pretty,--by some persons at least."

"Very pretty? handsome?" asked Losely, abruptly. "Handsome or not, what
does it signify? what good comes of beauty? You had beauty enough; what
have you done with it?"

At that question, Losely drew himself up with a sudden loftiness of look
and gesture, which, though prompted but by offended vanity, improved the
expression of the countenance, and restored to it much of its earlier
character. Mrs. Crane gazed on him, startled into admiration, and it was
in an altered voice, half reproachful, half bitter, that she continued,

"And now that you are satisfied about her, have you no questions to ask
about me?--what I do? how I live?" "My dear Mrs. Crane, I know that you
are comfortably off, and were never of a mercenary temper. I trust you
are happy, and so forth: I wish I were; things don't prosper with me. If
you could conveniently lend me a five-pound note--"

"You would borrow of me, Jasper? Ah! you come to me in your troubles.
You shall have the money,--five pounds, ten pounds, what you please, but
you will call again for it: you need me now; you will not utterly desert
me now?"