" said Libby, with a laugh of reminiscence. "He was huge.
But he had eyes like a girl,--I beg your pardon,--like yours."

"You mean that I have eyes like a man."

He laughed, and said, "No," and then turned grave. "As long as he
lived"--

"Oh, is he dead?" she asked more gently than she had yet spoken.

"Yes, he died just before I went abroad. I went out on business for my
father,--he's an importer and jobber,--and bought goods for him. Do you
despise business?"

"I don't know anything about it."

"I did it to please my father, and he said I was a very good buyer.
He thinks there's nothing like buying--except selling. He used to sell
things himself, over the counter, and not so long ago, either.

"I fancied it made a difference for me when I was in college, and that
the yardstick came between me and society. I was an ass for thinking
anything about it. Though I did n't really care, much. I never liked
society, and I did like boats and horses. I thought of a profession,
once. But it would n't work. I've been round the world twice, and I've
done nothing but enjoy myself since I left college,--or try to. When I
first saw you I was hesitating about letting my father make me of use.
He wants me to become one of the most respectable members of society,
he wants me to be a cotton-spinner. You know there 's nothing so
irreproachable as cotton, for a business?"

"No. I don't know about those things."

"Well, there is n't. When I was abroad, buying and selling, I made a
little discovery: I found that there were goods we could make and sell
in the European market cheaper than the English, and that gave my father
the notion of buying a mill to make them. I'm boring you!"

"No."

"Well, he bought it; and he wants me to take charge of it."

"And shall you?"

"Do you think I'm fit for it?"

"I? How should I know?"

"You don't know cotton; but you know me a little. Do I strike you as fit
for anything?" She made no reply to this, and he laughed. "I assure you
I felt small enough when I heard what you had done, and thought--what
I had done. It gave me a start; and I wrote my father that night that I
would go in for it."

"I once thought of going to a factory town," she answered, without
wilful evasion, "to begin my practice there among the operatives'
children. I should have done it if it had not been for coming here with
Mrs. Maynard. It would have been better."

"Come to my factory town, Miss Breen! There ought to