"Did my father say anything about himself?"
"Yes; he told me that he had been an unsuccessful man all his life, and had much to reproach himself with, for we got quite confidential at last. He added that he had a family in England--what family he didn't say--whom he was anxious to make wealthy by way of reparation for past misdeeds, and that was why he was treasure-hunting. However, from what you tell me, I fear he never found anything."
"No, Mr. Seymour, he never found it and never will, but all the same I am glad to hear that he was thinking of us. Also I should like to explore that place, Bambatse."
"So should I, Miss Clifford, in your company, and your father's, but not in that of Jacob. If ever you should go there with him, I say:--'Beware of Jacob.'"
"Oh! I am not afraid of Jacob," she answered with a laugh, "although I believe that my father still has something to do with him--at least in one of his letters he mentioned his partner, who was a German."
"A German! I think that he must have meant a German Jew."
After this there was silence between them for a time, then he said suddenly, "You have told me your story, would you like to hear mine?"
"Yes," she answered.
"Well, it won't take you long to listen to it, for, Miss Clifford, like Canning's needy knife-grinder, I have really none to tell. You see before you one of the most useless persons in the world, an undistinguished member of what is called in England the 'leisured class,' who can do absolutely nothing that is worth doing, except shoot straight."
"Indeed," said Benita.
"You do not seem impressed with that accomplishment," he went on, "yet it is an honest fact that for the last fifteen years--I was thirty-two this month--practically my whole time has been given up to it, with a little fishing thrown in in the spring. As I want to make the most of myself, I will add that I am supposed to be among the six best shots in England, and that my ambition--yes, great Heavens! my ambition--was to become better than the other five. By that sin fell the poor man who speaks to you. I was supposed to have abilities, but I neglected them all to pursue this form of idleness. I entered no profession, I did no work, with the result that at thirty-two I am ruined and almost hopeless."
"Why ruined and hopeless?" she asked anxiously, for the way in which they were spoken grieved her more than the words themselves.