Mrs. Pomfret, who had taken him in from crown to boots,
remarked that he looked very much like a gentleman.

"I came to see your father for a few moments--on business," Austen
explained.

She lifted her face to his with a second searching look.

"I'll take you to him," she said.

By this time a nimble groom had appeared from out o a shrubbery path and
seized Pepper's head. Austen alighted and followed Victoria into a great,
cool hallway, and through two darkened rooms, bewilderingly furnished and
laden with the scent of flowers, into a narrow passage beyond. She led
the way simply, not speaking, and her silence seemed to betoken the
completeness of an understanding between them, as of a long acquaintance.

In a plain white-washed room, behind a plain oaken desk, sat Mr. Flint--a
plain man. Austen thought he would have known him had he seen him on the
street. The other things in the room were letter-files, a safe, a
long-distance telephone, and a thin private secretary with a bend in his
back. Mr. Flint looked up from his desk, and his face, previously bereft
of illumination, lighted when he saw his daughter. Austen liked that in
him.

"Well, Vic, what is it now?" he asked.

"Mr. Austen Vane to see you," said Victoria, and with a quick glance at
Austen she left him standing on the threshold. Mr. Flint rose. His eyes
were deep-set in a square, hard head, and he appeared to be taking Austen
in without directly looking at him; likewise, one felt that Mr. Flint's
handshake was not an absolute gift of his soul.

"How do you do, Mr. Vane? I don't remember ever to have had the pleasure
of seeing you, although your father and I have been intimately connected
for many years."

So the president's manner was hearty, but not the substance. It came,
Austen thought, from a rarity of meeting with men on a disinterested
footing; and he could not but wonder how Mr. Flint would treat the angels
in heaven if he ever got there, where there were no franchises to be had.
Would he suspect them of designs upon his hard won harp and halo? Austen
did not dislike Mr. Flint; the man's rise, his achievements, his
affection for his daughter, he remembered. But he was also well aware
that Mr. Flint had thrown upon him the onus of the first move in a game
which the railroad president was used to playing every day. The dragon
was on his home ground and had the choice of weapons.

"I do not wish to bother you long," said Austen.

"No bother,