ly before his heart was being lowered under the bright
archery of Mary Burton's eyes.

At last he rose, and his chief said quietly, "Carl, I shall be an hour
late. Will you run down to the office and sit on the lid until I get
there?"

The secretary's brows went up. "You were to meet several of the
directors of the Inter-Ocean Coal and Ore at ten-fifteen," he reminded.

"Let them wait," retorted Burton placidly. "I'm usually punctual
enough."

"Ah!" exclaimed Mary with an adorable show of penitence, "and it is I
who am causing Monsieur Coal and Monsieur Ore to wait--I am so sorry!"

But, when Bristoll had gone and Hamilton had led the way into the
library, safe from the overhearing of the servants, the girl's manner
abruptly changed. She stood by the broad desk, resting her slender
fingers lightly on the mahogany top, and turned to her brother. Her
attitude was very straight and regal, and her voice, though still soft
and musical, had in it the quiet ring of defiance.

"So!" she said. "So, in my brother's house I come and go under orders?
So, I rise when he commands it and go to bed at his direction."

Hamilton Burton paused with his fingers on the knob of a wall-safe from
which he had meant to take a package that he had placed there as a gift
in celebration of her home-coming. It had pleased him, as he was shown
that rope of splendidly matched pearls in the establishment of the
continent's premier jeweller, that he was able to buy such gifts. Of the
twenty millions of families in America, nineteen million would have
regarded their cost as a large fortune upon whose income they could live
at ease while life lasted. But Hamilton Burton had been even prouder
that on his sister's throat their beauty would after all be the
secondary beauty, and with the eye of the connoisseur he had rejected
several of the graduated gems and demanded that in their place more
perfect ones be substituted. Agents of the great house, skilled in the
nuances of selection, had sought far to better them until the result was
satisfactory to the exacting taste of the purchaser.

Hamilton Burton was spoken of as a woman-hater. Society saw him rarely.
Power was his mistress and success his passion. His egotism, centering
on no deep love of his own and too fastidious for mere "affairs," left
him opportunity for an exaggerated family pride.

Now he halted with his fingers on the combination knob of the safe and
straightened up. The sun fell upo