"He doesn't," said Ferdy, sulkily. "He allows me next to nothing. I call him a skinflint. What's two hundred a year?"
"Very good pocket-money. He pays your bills, keeps you for nothing, and gives you four pounds a week to waste. Yet with all that, you borrow from Dr. Jerce. How much have you had?"
"Mine also. Tell me, or I'll tell Uncle Henry."
"Only a few hundreds," snarled Ferdy, reluctantly.
"A few hundreds!" Clarice sank into her seat and looked at Ferdy with consternation. "And how on earth have you spent so much, in addition to your own income?"
"Money will go," lamented Ferdy. "Whenever I break a pound, I never have any left within the hour."
"You'll bring disgrace on us some day," said Clarice, with a pained look. "Why didn't you come to me?"
"You're so high and mighty. You wouldn't have understood."
"I understand this much, that Dr. Jerce is the last man I should wish you to have money from."
"I did--I do, and I respect him. All the same, I wish you hadn't borrowed from him." Ferdinand rose and kicked the logs again in his petulant fashion. "I must have money somehow to enjoy myself."
"What's that--I want fifty. And after all, it's my own money. When we come of age in two years we each have two thousand a year. I don't see why Uncle Henry should grudge me cash in the way he does. If you don't want to spend it, I do. And what's more," cried Ferdy, working himself into a rage, "I'm going to."
"You shan't spend Dr. Jerce's money," said Clarice, and her mouth shut firmly, while her eyes glittered like steel.
"How can you stop me from getting it?" scoffed Fred, uneasily. "I can ask him to refuse you more. Dr. Jerce will do anything for me."
Ferdy scowled. "I know that," he said, moodily.
"He hinted that he was in love with you. If you were only a decent sort, Clarry, you would marry him and help me. He's got heaps of tin, and you'd be Lady Jerce some day, you know."
"Oh!" said Clarice, and her voice was as hard as her eyes, "did Dr. Jerce ask you to speak to me?"
"No! no, on my honour he didn't; but he hinted that he'd like you to be his wife. I never said anything."
"Not even that I am engaged to Anthony Ackworth."
Ferdy looked up in genuine surprise. "Oh, by Jove, you ain't!"