"
"Certainly not. I would sooner be in a work-house."
"And here there is provided for you an income on which you can
live. Not a soul will know anything about it. Even your own father
need not be told. As for the lawyer, that is nothing. They never
talk of things. It would make a man comparatively poor quite a fit
match. Or, if you do not marry, it would enable you to live where
you pleased independently of me. You had better think twice of it
before you refuse it."
"I will not think of it at all. As sure as I am living here I will
write to Rufford this very evening and tell him in what light I
regard both him and you."
"And what will you do then?"
"Hang myself."
"That is all very well, Arabella, but hanging yourself and jumping
off Waterloo Bridge do not mean anything. You must live, and you
must pay your debts" I can't pay them for you. You go into your own
room, and think of it all, and be thankful for what Providence has
sent you."
"You may as well understand that I am in earnest," the daughter
said as she left the room. "I shall write to Lord Rufford to-day
and tell him what I think of him and his money. You need not
trouble yourself as to what shall be done with it; for I certainly
shall not take it."
And she did write to Lord Rufford as follows:
My Lord,
I have been much astonished by a letter I have received from a
gentleman in London, Mr.
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