"

"I can't go," said Mildred. "I'm dining with the Fassetts."

The family no longer had a servant in constant attendance in the
dining-room. The maid of many functions also acted as butler and as
fetch-and-carry between kitchen and butler's pantry. Before speaking,
Presbury waited until this maid had withdrawn to bring the roast and
the vegetables. Then he said:

"You are going, too, miss." This with the full infusion of insult into
the "miss."

Mildred was silent.

"Bill Siddall is looking for a wife," proceeded Presbury. "And he has
Heaven knows how many millions."

"Do you think there's a chance for Milly?" cried Mrs. Presbury, who was
full of alternating hopes and fears, both wholly irrational.

"She can have him--if she wants him," replied Presbury. "But it's only
fair to warn her that he's a stiff dose."

"Is the money--CERTAIN?" inquired Mildred's mother with that shrewdness
whose rare occasional displays laid her open to the unjust suspicion of
feigning her habitual stupidity.

"Yes," said Presbury amiably. "It's nothing like yours was. He's so
rich he doesn't know what to do with his income. He owns mines
scattered all over the world. And if they all failed, he's got bundles
of railway stocks and bonds, and gilt-edged trust stocks, too. And he's
a comparatively young man--hardly fifty, I should say. He pretends to
be forty."

"It's strange I never heard of him," said Mrs. Presbury.

"If you went to South America or South Africa or Alaska, you'd hear of
him," said Presbury. He laughed. "And I guess you'd hear some pretty
dreadful things. When I knew him twenty-five years ago he had just been
arrested for forging my father's name to a check. But he got out of
that--and it's all past and gone. Probably he hasn't committed any
worse crimes than have most of our big rich men. Bill's handicap has
been that he hadn't much education or any swell relatives. But he's a
genius at money-making." Presbury looked at Mildred with a grin. "And
he's just the husband for Mildred. She can't afford to be too
particular. Somebody's got to support her. _I_ can't and won't, and
she can't support herself."

"You'll go--won't you, Mildred?" said her mother. "He may not be so
bad."

"Yes, I'll go," said Mildred. Her gaze was upon the untouched food on
her plate.

"Of course she'll go," said Presbury. "And she'll marry him if she
can. Won't you, miss?"

He spoke in his amiably insulting way--as