“Henry, I’m ashamed of you. You don’t half thank the good gentleman. May I do it for you?”
“Indeed, you shall, dear, if you can improve it. Let us see you try.”
She walked to my man, got up in his lap, put her arm round his neck, and kissed him right on the mouth. Then the two old gentlemen shouted with laughter, but I was dumfounded, just petrified, as you may say. Portia said:
“Papa, he has said you haven’t a situation in your gift that he’d take; and I feel just as hurt as–”
“My darling, is that your papa?”
“Yes; he’s my step-papa, and the dearest one that ever was. You understand now, don’t you, why I was able to laugh when you told me at the minister’s, not knowing my relationships, what trouble and worry papa’s and Uncle Abel’s scheme was giving you?”
“Oh, my dearest dear sir, I want to take back what I said. You have got a situation open that I want.”
“Name it.”
“Son-in-law.”
“Well, well, well! But you know, if you haven’t ever served in that capacity, you, of course, can’t furnish recommendations of a sort to satisfy the conditions of the contract, and so–”
“Try me–oh, do, I beg of you! Only just try me thirty or forty years, and if–”
“Oh, well, all right; it’s but a little thing to ask, take her along.”
Happy, we two? There are not words enough in the unabridged to describe it. And when London got the whole history, a day or two later, of my month’s adventures with that bank-note, and how they ended, did London talk, and have a good time?
Yes.
My Portia’s papa took that friendly and hospitable bill back to the Bank of England and cashed it; then the Bank canceled it and made him a present of it, and he gave it to us at our wedding, and it has always hung in its frame in the sacredest place in our home ever since. For it gave me my Portia. But for it I could not have remained in London, would not have appeared at the minister’s, never should have met her. And so I always say, “Yes, it’s a million-pounder, as you see; but it never made but one purchase in its life, and then got the article for only about a tenth part of its value.”
THE END.
喜欢这个结局。
富家女闷骚假扮卧底，
勇亨利智斗名利双收。
虽然物欲横流，
不失真诚本色，
顺势而为，
不惧不贪。
终成善果。
男主人公的父亲是耶鲁毕业生，
父亲的朋友是名流。
自己有金融知识，
有辨别能力，
品行也好，
巨款在手，
仍能做到，
谨小慎微，
这样的人,
给个机会，
就会平步青云，
意料之外，
情理之中。
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