r gets nothin' to eat. If ever a feller
needed a nice, sensible wife to take care of him, it's Gil. I know. Ain't I
his uncle?"

"You think she would--make him--a good wife?" Lucia Pell got the words out
somehow, never lifting her eyes from the printed page.

"The finest in the world!" Uncle Henry affirmed. "Now, looky here, Mis'
Pell: He won't listen to me--funny the way folks are about their relatives.
But I was thinkin' that mebbe if you was to ask him--"

Lucia was startled. "I?" she said.

The wheel chair bobbed about. "Yes. You and him bein' old friends that way,
mebbe he'd pay some attention to you. Make him see what a gol darn fool he
is and give him h----. Give it to him good! It's a wonderful chance. He'll
never get another. Darned if I see how he ever got this. But he has. And
what we gotter do is to make him take it." He paused; but she said nothing.
He waited a moment. Then,--"What do you say? Will you?"

"You--think he should?"

"I know darn well he should!"

Lucia closed the book and put it down. She looked straight at Uncle Henry.
"I should think he would see it for himself."

Uncle Henry showed his disgust--not for her, but for his nephew. "Aw, he's
always been like this. I remember five or six years ago, he told me then he
wouldn't ask no woman to marry him until he got a lot of money. False
pride, I call it. What'd the world come to if everybody felt like that?"

"You think it's only pride that's keeping him from it?" Her voice was very
low.

"Well, what else could it be, I'd like to know."

"Maybe it's because he hasn't a lot of money. He may be honest in that."

"Well, mebbe you're right. That may be it. What do you say?"

"All right," Lucia Pell said. But she turned away.

Uncle Henry was delighted. "That's the idee! Hooray!" Had he been able to
stand, he would have risen and given three rousing cheers. He hadn't been
so happy in years. "We'll put it over yet, by heck!"

He hadn't seen his nephew come into the room, with a ball of stout twine in
his hands.

"Put what over?" Gilbert asked.

Uncle Henry was taken aback, but he quickly covered his confusion.

"Oh, somethin'. It's a secret." He turned and addressed Lucia Pell. "Don't
forget," he admonished, and swiftly wheeled himself out into the yard
again.

CHAPTER VI

WHEREIN AN OLD LOVE AWAKENS, PELL REVEALS HIS TRUE COLORS, A MORTGAGE IS
ABOUT TO BE FORECLOSED, THE CONTENTS OF A SATCHEL ARE MADE KNOWN, UNCLE
HENRY S