t you had large private means."

"I know you did. And he spent all his time showing me over houses and
telling me I could have them for a hundred thousand dollars cash
down." Jill bubbled. "You should have seen his face when I told him
that twenty dollars was all I had in the world!"

"You didn't tell him that!"

"I did."

Uncle Chris shook his head, like an indulgent father disappointed in a
favourite child.

"You're a dear girl, Jill, but really you do seem totally lacking
in ... how shall I put it?--finesse. Your mother was just the same. A
sweet woman, but with no diplomacy, no notion of _handling_ a
situation. I remember her as a child giving me away hopelessly on one
occasion after we had been at the jam-cupboard. She did not mean any
harm, but she was constitutionally incapable of a tactful negative at
the right time." Uncle Chris brooded for a moment on the past. "Oh,
well, it's a very fine trait, no doubt, though inconvenient. I don't
blame you for leaving Brookport if you weren't happy there. But I wish
you had consulted me before going on the stage."

"Shall I strike this man?" asked Jill of the world at large. "How
could I consult you? My darling, precious uncle, don't you realize
that you had vanished into thin air, leaving me penniless? I had to do
something. And, now that we are on the subject, perhaps you will
explain your movements. Why did you write to me from that place on
Fifty-seventh Street if you weren't there?"

Uncle Chris cleared his throat.

"In a sense ... when I wrote ... I _was_ there."

"I suppose that means something, but it's beyond me. I'm not nearly as
intelligent as you think, Uncle Chris, so you'll have to explain."

"Well, it was this way, my dear. I was in a peculiar position you must
remember. I had made a number of wealthy friends on the boat and it is
possible that--unwittingly--I gave them the impression that I was as
comfortably off as themselves. At any rate, that is the impression they
gathered, and it hardly seemed expedient to correct it. For it is a
deplorable trait in the character of the majority of rich people that they
only--er--expand--they only show the best and most companionable side of
themselves to those whom they imagine to be as wealthy as they are. Well,
of course, while one was on the boat, the fact that I was sailing under
what a purist might have termed false colours did not matter. The problem
was how to keep up the--er--innocent deception aft