“What did he mean by that?”
“Well, it seems that he was in a hurry to get this Green Mummy from Malta, as he feared lest some other person should snap it up. This was two months ago, remember, and Professor Braddock wanted the cash at once. Had Random been here he could have supplied it, but as Random was away he told me that if I handed over one thousand pounds to purchase the mummy, that he would permit our engagement now, and our marriage in six months. I saw my chance and took it, for your step-father has always been an obstacle in our path, Lucy, dear. In a week Professor Braddock had the money, as I sold out some of my investments to get it. He then sent Bolton to Malta in a tramp steamer for the sake of cheapness, and now expects him back with the Green Mummy.”
“Has Sidney bought it?”
“Yes. He got it for nine hundred pounds, the Professor told me, and is bringing it back in The Diver—that's the same tramp steamer in which he went to Malta. So that's the whole story, and you can see there is no question of you being bought. The thousand pounds went to get your father's consent.”
“He is not my father,” snapped Lucy, finding nothing else to say.
“You call him so.”
“That is only from habit. I can't call him Mr. Braddock, or Professor Braddock, when I live with him, so `father' is the sole mode of address left to me. And after all,” she added, taking her lover's arm, “I like the Professor; he is very kind and good, although extremely absent-minded. And I am glad he has consented, for he worried me a lot to marry Sir Frank Random. I am glad you bought me.”
“But I didn't,” cried the exasperated lover.
“I think you did, and you shouldn't have diminished your income by buying what you could have had for nothing.”
Archie shrugged his shoulders. It was vain to combat her fixed idea.
“I have still three hundred a year left. And you were worth buying.”
“You have no right to talk of me as though I had been bought.”
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