he possible.

"He'd sell for less than that, of course, but one would need a bit in
hand. You have to face a loss on the road before coming into New York.
I'd give you ten per cent on your money, Sally."

Sally found herself wavering. The prudent side of her nature, which
hitherto had steered her safely through most of life's rapids, seemed
oddly dormant. Sub-consciously she was aware that on past performances
Fillmore was decidedly not the man to be allowed control of anybody's
little fortune, but somehow the thought did not seem to grip her. He had
touched her imagination.

"It's a gold-mine!"

Sally's prudent side stirred in its sleep. Fillmore had chosen an
unfortunate expression. To the novice in finance the word gold-mine
had repellent associations. If there was one thing in which Sally had
proposed not to invest her legacy, it was a gold-mine; what she had had
in view, as a matter of fact, had been one of those little fancy shops
which are called Ye Blue Bird or Ye Corner Shoppe, or something like
that, where you sell exotic bric-a-brac to the wealthy at extortionate
prices. She knew two girls who were doing splendidly in that line. As
Fillmore spoke those words, Ye Corner Shoppe suddenly looked very good
to her.

At this moment, however, two things happened. Gerald and Mr. Bunbury,
in the course of their perambulations, came into the glow of the
footlights, and she was able to see Gerald's face: and at the same time
Mr. Reginald Cracknell hurried on to the stage, his whole demeanour that
of the bearer of evil tidings.

The sight of Gerald's face annihilated Sally's prudence at a single
stroke. Ye Corner Shoppe, which a moment before had been shining
brightly before her mental eye, flickered and melted out. The whole
issue became clear and simple. Gerald was miserable and she had it in
her power to make him happy. He was sullenly awaiting disaster and she
with a word could avert it. She wondered that she had ever hesitated.

"All right," she said simply.

Fillmore quivered from head to foot. A powerful electric shock could not
have produced a stronger convulsion. He knew Sally of old as cautious
and clear-headed, by no means to be stampeded by a brother's eloquence;
and he had never looked on this thing as anything better than a hundred
to one shot.

"You'll do it?" he whispered, and held his breath. After all he might
not have heard correctly.

"Yes."

All the complex emotion in Fillmore's soul fo