d my questions," she reproached him, as she
emerged, rosy and radiant, from the embrace that had accompanied the
culmination of his narrative.

"Now just what do you want to know?" he asked.

"I want to know how all this is possible? How you are able to leave
your business at a time like this? What you meant by saying that
something was going to happen quickly? I--" She hesitated and blushed.
"I answered your question, you know."

"Let's go and get married," he urged, all the whimsicality of his
utterance duplicated in his eyes. "You know I've got to make way for
that husky young brother of mine, and I ain't got long to live." She
made an impatient moue, and he continued seriously.

"You see, it's like this, Dede. I've been working like forty horses
ever since this blamed panic set in, and all the time some of those
ideas you'd given me were getting ready to sprout. Well, they sprouted
this morning, that's all. I started to get up, expecting to go to the
office as usual. But I didn't go to the office. All that sprouting
took place there and then. The sun was shining in the window, and I
knew it was a fine day in the hills. And I knew I wanted to ride in
the hills with you just about thirty million times more than I wanted
to go to the office. And I knew all the time it was impossible. And
why? Because of the office. The office wouldn't let me. All my money
reared right up on its hind legs and got in the way and wouldn't let
me. It's a way that blamed money has of getting in the way. You know
that yourself.

"And then I made up my mind that I was to the dividing of the ways.
One way led to the office. The other way led to Berkeley. And I took
the Berkeley road. I'm never going to set foot in the office again.
That's all gone, finished, over and done with, and I'm letting it slide
clean to smash and then some. My mind's set on this. You see, I've
got religion, and it's sure the old-time religion; it's love and you,
and it's older than the oldest religion in the world. It's IT, that's
what it is--IT, with a capital I-T."

She looked at him with a sudden, startled expression.

"You mean--?" she began.

"I mean just that. I'm wiping the slate clean. I'm letting it all go
to smash. When them thirty million dollars stood up to my face and
said I couldn't go out with you in the hills to-day, I knew the time
had come for me to put my foot down. And I'm putting it down. I've
got you, and my str