nd I married. I ain't buyin'
your son, nor sellin' my daughter. That's my last word, Tillie."

On impulse, he pressed the electric button in the wall behind him.
When the new upstairs girl came, he said: "Tell the children I want
to see 'em."

Arthur and Adelaide presently came, flushed with the exercise of the
tennis the girl had interrupted.

"Mrs. Whitney, here," said Hiram, "tells me her children won't marry
without settlements, as it's called. And I've been tellin' her that my
son and daughter ain't buyin' and sellin'."

Mrs. Whitney hid her fury. "Your father has a quaint way of expressing
himself," she said, laughing elegantly. "I've simply been trying to
persuade him to do as much toward securing the future of you two as Mr.
Whitney is willing to do. Don't be absurd, Hiram. You know better than to
talk that way."

Hiram looked steadily at her. "You've been travelin' about, 'Tilda,"
he said, "gettin' together a lot of newfangled notions. Ellen and I
and our children stick to the old way." And he looked at Arthur, then
at Adelaide.

Their faces gave him a twinge at the heart. "Speak up!" he said. "Do you
or do you not stick to the old way?"

"I can't talk about it, father," was Adelaide's evasive answer, her face
scarlet and her eyes down.

"And you, sir?" said Hiram to his son.

"You'll have to excuse me, sir," replied Arthur coldly.

Hiram winced before Mrs. Whitney's triumphant glance. He leaned forward
and, looking at his daughter, said: "Del, would you marry a man who
wouldn't take you unless you brought him a fortune?"

"No, father," Adelaide answered. She was meeting his gaze now. "But, at
the same time, I'd rather not be dependent on my husband."

"Do you think your mother is dependent on me?"

"That's different," said Adelaide, after a pause.

"How?" asked Hiram.

Adelaide did not answer, could not answer. To answer honestly would be
to confess that which had been troubling her greatly of late--the
feeling that there was something profoundly unsatisfactory in the
relations between Ross and herself; that what he was giving her was
different not only in degree but even in kind from what she wanted, or
ought to want, from what she was trying to give him, or thought she
ought to try to give him.

"And you, Arthur?" asked Hiram in the same solemn, appealing tone.

"I should not ask Janet to marry me unless I was sure I could support her
in the manner to which she is accustomed," said Arth