istening I
should have asked his, and I fancy yours is fully as valuable. Come,
shall we have this racing manager?"

Astonished, she looked from her uncle to the other man. And perhaps it
was the real anxiety and suspense of Bailey's expression that drew her
quick reply.

"Let us, uncle. Since we need him, let us have him."

"Very well," said Mr. Ffrench. "You hear, Bailey."

There was a long silence after the junior partner's withdrawal.

"Come where I can see you, Emily," her uncle finally demanded. "I
liked your decided answer a few moments ago; you can reason. How long
have you been a daughter in my house?"

"Six years," she responded, obediently moving to a low chair opposite.
"I was fifteen when you took me from the convent--to make me very,
very happy, dear."

"I sent for you when I sent for Dick, and for the same reason. I have
tried three times to rear one of my name to fitness to bear it, and
each one has failed except you. I wish you were a man, Emily; there
is work for a Ffrench to do."

"When you say that, I wish I were. But--I'm not, I'm not." She flung
out her slender, round arms in a gesture of helpless resignation. "I'm
not even a strong-minded woman who might do instead. Uncle Ethan, may
I ask--it was Mr. Bailey who made me think--my cousin whom I never
saw, will he never come home?"

Her voice faltered on the last words, frightened at her own daring.
But her uncle answered evenly, if coldly:

"Never."

"He offended you so?"

"His whole life was an offense. School, college, at home, in each he
went wrong. At twenty-one he left me and married a woman from the
vaudeville stage. It is not of him you are to think, Emily, but of a
substitute for him. For that I designed Dick; once I hoped you would
marry him and sober his idleness."

"Please, no," she refused gently. "I am fond of Dick, but--please,
no."

"I am not asking it of you. He is well enough, a good boy, not
overwise, but not what is needed here. Failed, again; I am not
fortunate. There is left only you."

"Me?"

Her startled dark eyes and his determined gray ones met, and so
remained.

"You, and your husband. Are you going to marry a man who can take my
place in this business, in the factory and the model village my
brother and I built around it; a man whose name will be fit to join
with ours and so in a fashion preserve it here? Will you wait until
such a one is found and will you aid me to find him? Or will you too
foll