anticipate your needs; and hence at some future moment this question of supplies must arise—unless they are disposed of before your marriage."
"If that could be done, Mr. Hopkins," says he, hopefully.
"It may be done, sir, very easily. With your cousin's consent and yours, I, as her elected guardian, at this time will have a deed drawn up to be signed by you and her, settling one-half the estate upon you, and the other on your cousin. This will make you not her debtor, but her benefactor; for without this deed, all that is now hers becomes yours by legal right upon your marriage, and she could not justly give away a shilling without your permission. And thus you assure to her the same independence that you yourself would maintain."
"Very good," says Don Sanchez, in a sonorous voice of approval, as he lies back in his high chair, his eyes closed, and a cigarro in the corner of his mouth.
"I thank you with all my heart, Mr. Hopkins," says Mr. Godwin, warmly. "I entreat you have this deed drawn up—if it be my wife's wish."
"You may count with certainty on that," says I; "for if my arguments lacked power, I have but to say 'tis your desire, and 'twould be done though it took the last penny from her."
He made no reply to this, but bending forward he gazed into the fire, with a rapture in his face, pressing one hand within the other as if it were his sweetheart's.
"In the meantime," says I, "if you have necessity for a hundred or two in advance, you have but to give me your note of hand."
"Can you do me this service?" cries he, eagerly. "Can you let me have five hundred by to-morrow?"
