"Do you really believe that?" he asked.

"What?" she inquired, vaguely.

"Oh, all that you say in your essay. Do you really believe that all
the property in the world ought to be divided, that kings and
peasants ought to share and share alike?"

She looked at him with round eyes. "Why, of course I do!" she said.
"Don't you?"

Robert laughed. He had no mind to enter into an argument with this
beautiful girl, nor even to express himself forcibly on the opposite
side.

"Well, there are a number of things to be considered," he said. "And
do you really believe that employer and employes should share
alike?"

"Why not?" said she.

Her blue eyes flashed, she tossed her head. Robert smiled at her.

"Why not?" she repeated. "Don't the men earn the money?"

"Well, no, not exactly," said Robert. "There is the capital."

"The profit comes from the labor, not from the capital," said Ellen,
quickly. "Doesn't it?" she continued, with fervor, and yet there was
a charming timidity, as before some authority.

"Possibly," replied Robert, guardedly; "but the question is how far
we should go back before we stop in searching for causes."

"How far back ought we to go?" asked Ellen, earnestly.

"I confess I don't know," said Robert, laughingly. "I have thought
very little about it all."

"But you will have to, if you are to be the head of Lloyd's," Ellen
said, with a severe accent, with grave, blue eyes full on his face.

"Oh, I am not the head of Lloyd's yet," he answered, easily. "My
uncle is far from his dotage. Then, too, you know that I was never
intended for a business man, but a lawyer, like my father, if there
had not been so little for my father's second wife and the
children--" He stopped himself abruptly on the verge of a
confidence. "I think I saw you on your way to the photographer
to-day," he said, and Ellen blushed, remembering her aunt Eva's
violent nudge, and wondering if he had noticed. She gave him a
piteous glance.

"Yes," she said. "All the girls have their pictures taken in their
graduating dresses with their flowers."

"You looked to me as if the picture would be a great success," said
Robert. He longed to ask for one and yet did not, for a reason
unexplained to himself. He knew that this innocent, unsophisticated
creature would see no reason on earth why he should not ask, and no
reason why she should not grant, and on that account he felt
prohibited. That night, after he had gone, Ellen won