It was true that, as no woman's disgrace was confessedly traced to him, so neither was any man's ruin--save only in the doubtful instance of the unfortunate Johnstone.

He never won of any person, however ardent, more than a certain portion of his fortune--the rest of his undoing Saville left to his satellites; nay, even those who had in reality most reason to complain of him, never perceived his due share in their impoverishment.

It was common enough to hear men say, "Ah! Saville, I wish I had taken your advice, and left off while I had yet half my fortune!" They did not accurately heed that the first half was Saville's; because the first half had excited, not ruined them.
Besides this method of making money, so strictly social, Saville had also applied his keen intellect and shrewd sense to other speculations.
Cheap houses, cheap horses, fluctuations in the funds, all descriptions of property (except perhaps stolen goods), had passed under his earnest attention; and in most cases, such speculations had eminently succeeded.
He was therefore now, in his middle age, and still unmarried, a man decidedly wealthy; having, without ever playing miser, without ever stinting a luxury, or denying a wish, turned nothing into something, poverty into opulence.
It was noon; and Saville was slowly finishing his morning repast, and conversing with a young man stretched on a sofa opposite in a listless attitude.

The room was in perfect keeping with the owner: there was neither velvet, nor gilding, nor buhl, nor marquetrie--all of which would have been inconsistent with the moderate size of the apartment.
But the furniture was new, massive, costly, and luxurious without the ostentation of luxury.

A few good pictures, and several exquisite busts and figures in bronze, upon marble pedestals, gave something classic and graceful to the aspect of the room.