perceiving the eagerness in Mr. Fred's
eyes. "You're just tickled to death."

"Well, perhaps I am," said Fred, laughing at his friend's serious face.
"Say, she has a way with her--hasn't she now?"

Miss Louise Varney did not seem over-delighted at the spectacle of a
guest in the party as she came running out, backed by the vigilant
dowager figure of Mrs. Varney, who never let her daughter out of her
charge. But whatever irritation she might have felt she concealed under
a charming smile, while Mrs. Varney, accustomed to swinging in solitary
dignity in the back seat, welcomed him with genuine enthusiasm.

"Well, Mr. Crocker, isn't this grand! You and me can sit here flirting
on the back seat and let them whisper sweet nothings." She tapped him on
the arm, saying in a half voice: "Say, they certainly are a good looking
team now, ain't they?"

The old Grenadier, as she was affectionately termed by her daughter's
admirers, was out in her war paint, dressed like a debutante, fatly
complacent and smiling with the prospect of a delicious lunch at the end
of the drive.

"Say, I think Fred's the sweetest feller," she began, beaming on Bojo,
"and so smart too. Louise says he could make a forchin in vaudeville. I
think he's much cleverer than that Pinkle feller who gets two-fifty a
week for giving imitations on the pianner. Why haven't you been around,
Mr. Crocker?" She nudged him again, her maternal gaze fondly fixed on
her daughter. "Isn't she a dream in that cute little hat? My Lord, I
should think all the men would be just crazy about her."

"Most of them are, I should say," said Bojo, and, smiling, he nodded in
the direction of Fred DeLancy, who was at that moment in the throes of a
difficult explanation.

Mrs. Varney gave a huge sigh and proceeded confidentially.

"'Course Louise's got a great future, every one says, and vaudeville
does pay high when you get to be a top notcher; but, my sakes, Mr.
Crocker, money isn't everything in this world, as I often told her--"

"Mother, be quiet--you're talking too much," said Miss Louise Varney
abruptly, whose alert little ear was always trained for maternal
indiscretions. Mrs. Varney, as was her habit, withdrew into an attitude
of sulky aloofness, not to relax until they were cozily ensconced at a
corner table in a wayside inn for luncheon. By this time Miss Varney had
evidently decided to accept the protestations of DeLancy, and peace
having been declared and the old Grena