use of our wasting another year?"

Mrs. Manson Mingott screwed up her little mouth into a grimace of mimic
prudery and twinkled at him through malicious lids. "'Ask Mamma,' I
suppose--the usual story. Ah, these Mingotts--all alike! Born in a
rut, and you can't root 'em out of it. When I built this house you'd
have thought I was moving to California! Nobody ever HAD built above
Fortieth Street--no, says I, nor above the Battery either, before
Christopher Columbus discovered America. No, no; not one of them wants
to be different; they're as scared of it as the small-pox. Ah, my dear
Mr. Archer, I thank my stars I'm nothing but a vulgar Spicer; but
there's not one of my own children that takes after me but my little
Ellen." She broke off, still twinkling at him, and asked, with the
casual irrelevance of old age: "Now, why in the world didn't you marry
my little Ellen?"

Archer laughed. "For one thing, she wasn't there to be married."

"No--to be sure; more's the pity. And now it's too late; her life is
finished." She spoke with the cold-blooded complacency of the aged
throwing earth into the grave of young hopes. The young man's heart
grew chill, and he said hurriedly: "Can't I persuade you to use your
influence with the Wellands, Mrs. Mingott? I wasn't made for long
engagements."

Old Catherine beamed on him approvingly. "No; I can see that. You've
got a quick eye. When you were a little boy I've no doubt you liked to
be helped first." She threw back her head with a laugh that made her
chins ripple like little waves. "Ah, here's my Ellen now!" she
exclaimed, as the portieres parted behind her.

Madame Olenska came forward with a smile. Her face looked vivid and
happy, and she held out her hand gaily to Archer while she stooped to
her grandmother's kiss.

"I was just saying to him, my dear: 'Now, why didn't you marry my
little Ellen?'"

Madame Olenska looked at Archer, still smiling. "And what did he
answer?"

"Oh, my darling, I leave you to find that out! He's been down to
Florida to see his sweetheart."

"Yes, I know." She still looked at him. "I went to see your mother,
to ask where you'd gone. I sent a note that you never answered, and I
was afraid you were ill."

He muttered something about leaving unexpectedly, in a great hurry, and
having intended to write to her from St. Augustine.

"And of course once you were there you never thought of me again!" She
continued to beam on