There was something perfectly electric in the brevity of his venerable friend. He stared harder than ever.
"Don't you understand me?" asked Sir Patrick.
"I don't understand what the moist sugar has got to do with it, Sir."
"You don't see that?"
"Not a bit!"
"Then I'll show you," said Sir Patrick, crossing his legs, and setting in comfortably for a good talk "You go to the tea-shop, and get your moist sugar. You take it on the understanding that it is moist sugar. But it isn't any thing of the sort. It's a compound of adulterations made up to look like sugar. You shut your eyes to that awkward fact, and swallow your adulterated mess in various articles of food; and you and your sugar get on together in that way as well as you can. Do you follow me, so far?"
Yes. Arnold (quite in the dark) followed, so far.
"Very good," pursued Sir Patrick. "You go to the marriage-shop, and get a wife. You take her on the understanding--let us say--that she has lovely yellow hair, that she has an exquisite complexion, that her figure is the perfection of plumpness, and that she is just tall enough to carry the plumpness off. You bring her home, and you discover that it's the old story of the sugar over again. Your wife is an adulterated article. Her lovely yellow hair is--dye. Her exquisite skin is--pearl powder. Her plumpness is--padding. And three inches of her height are--in the boot-maker's heels. Shut your eyes, and swallow your adulterated wife as you swallow your adulterated sugar--and, I tell you again, you are one of the few men who can try the marriage experiment with a fair chance of success."
With that he uncrossed his legs again, and looked hard at Arnold.
Arnold read the lesson, at last, in the right way. He gave up the hopeless attempt to circumvent Sir Patrick, and--come what might of it--dashed at a direct allusion to Sir Patrick's niece.
"That may be all very true, Sir, of some young ladies," he said.
"There is one I know of, who is nearly related to you, and who doesn't deserve what you have said of the rest of them."
This was coming to the point. Sir Patrick showed his approval of Arnold's frankness by coming to the point himself, as readily as his own whimsical humor would let him.
"Is this female phenomenon my niece?" he inquired.
"Yes, Sir Patrick."
"May I ask how you know that my niece is not an adulterated article, like the rest of them?"
Arnold's indignation loosened the last restraints that tied Arnold's tongue. He exploded in the three words which mean three volumes in every circulating library in the kingdom.
"I love her."
Sir Patrick sat back in his chair, and stretched out his legs luxuriously.
"That's the most convincing answer I ever heard in my life," he said.
"I'm in earnest!" cried Arnold, reckless by this time of every consideration but one. "Put me to the test, Sir! put me to the test!"
"Oh, very well. The test is easily put." He looked at Arnold, with the irrepressible humor twinkling merrily in his eyes, and twitching sharply at the corners of his lips. "My niece has a beautiful complexion. Do you believe in her complexion?"
"There's a beautiful sky above our heads," returned Arnold. "I believe in the sky."
"Do you?" retorted Sir Patrick. "You were evidently never caught in a shower. My niece has an immense quantity of hair. Are you convinced that it all grows on her head?"
"I defy any other woman's head to produce the like of it!"
"My dear Arnold, you greatly underrate the existing resources of the trade in hair! Look into the shop-windows. When you next go to London pray look into the show-windows. In the mean time, what do you think of my niece's figure?"
"Oh, come! there can't be any doubt about _that!_ Any man, with eyes in his head, can see it's the loveliest figure in the world."
Sir Patrick laughed softly, and crossed his legs again.
"My good fellow, of course it is! The loveliest figure in the world is the commonest thing in the world. At a rough guess, there are forty ladies at this lawn-party. Every one of them possesses a beautiful figure. It varies in price; and when it's particularly seductive you may swear it comes from Paris. Why, how you stare! When I asked you what you thought of my niece's figure, I meant--how much of it comes from Nature, and how much of it comes from the Shop? I don't know, mind! Do you?"
"I'll take my oath to every inch of it!"
"Shop?"
"Nature!"
Sir Patrick rose to his feet; his satirical humor was silenced at last.
"If ever I have a son," he thought to himself, "that son shall go to sea!" He took Arnold's arm, as a preliminary to putting an end to Arnold's suspense. "If I _ can_ be serious about any thing," he resumed, "it's time to be serious with you. I am convinced of the sincerity of your attachment. All I know of you is in your favor, and your birth and position are beyond dispute. If you have Blanche's consent, you have mine." Arnold attempted to express his gratitude. Sir Patrick, declining to hear him, went on. "And remember this, in the future. When you next want any thing that I can give you, ask for it plainly. Don't attempt to mystify _me_ on the next occasion, and I will promise, on my side, not to mystify _you._ There, that's understood. Now about this journey of yours to see your estate. Property has its duties, Master Arnold, as well as its rights. The time is fast coming when its rights will be disputed, if its duties are not performed. I have got a new interest in you, and I mean to see that you do your duty. It's settled you are to leave Windygates to-day. Is it arranged how you are to go?"
