Why should I, Mr. Jonathan?"

"You don't soften the blow--but why 'Mr. Jonathan'?"

"I thought it was your name."

"It's not my name to you--I say, Molly, do you mind my telling you that
you're a brick?"

"Oh, no, not if you feel like it."

"I do feel like it tremendously."

"Then I don't mind in the least," and to prove it she smiled radiantly
into his face. Her smile was the one really beautiful thing about Molly,
but as far as her immediate purpose went it served her as successfully
as a host.

"By George, I like your devotion to the old chap!" he exclaimed. "I hope
a girl will stick by me as squarely when I am beginning to totter."

"Have you ever been as good to one?" she asked quite seriously, and
wondered why he laughed.

"Well, I doubt if I ever have, but I'd like very much to begin."

"You're not a grandfather, Mr. Jonathan."

"No, I'm not a grandfather--but, when I come to think of it, I'm a
cousin."

She accepted this with composure. "Are you?" she inquired indifferently
after a minute.

While she spoke he asked himself if she were really dull, or if she
had already learned to fence with her exrustic weapons? Her face was
brimming with expression, but, as he reminded himself, one never could
tell.

"I haven't any cousin but you, Molly. Don't you think you can agree to
take me?"

She shook her head, and he saw, or imagined he saw, the shadow of her
indignant surprise darken her features.

"I've never thought of you as my cousin," she answered.

"But I am, Molly."

"I don't think of you so," she retorted. Again, as in the case
of Kesiah's advances, she was refusing to constitute a law by her
acknowledgment.

"Don't you think if you tried very hard you might begin to?"

"Why should I try?"

"Well, suppose we say just because I want you to."

"That wouldn't help me. I can't feel that it would make any difference."

"What I want, you mean?"

"Yes, what you want."

"Aren't you a shade more tolerant of my existence than you were at
first?"

"I suppose so, but I've never thought about it--any more than I've
thought of this ten thousand a year. It's all outside of my life, but
grandfather's in it."

"Don't you ever feel that you'd like to get outside of it yourself? The
world's a big place."

For the first time she appeared attentive to his words.

"I've often wondered what it was like--especially the cities--New York,
Paris, London. Paris is the best, isn't it?"

"Yes, Paris