. "We will now," he announced,
"go into committee of the whole and decide how we are to face financial
failure. Our assets consist of two stories, accepted, but not paid for,
and fifteen stories not accepted." In cash, he spread upon the table
a meagre collection of soiled bills and coins. "We have twenty-seven
dollars and fourteen cents. That is every penny we possess in the
world."

Dolly regarded him fixedly and shook her head.

"Is it wicked," she asked, "to love you so?"

"Haven't you been listening to me?" demanded Carter.

Again Dolly shook her head.

"I was watching the way you talk. When your lips move fast they do such
charming things."

"Do you know," roared Carter, "that we haven't a penny in the world,
that we have nothing in this flat to eat?"

"I still have five hats," said Dolly.

"We can't eat hats," protested Champneys.

"We can sell hats!" returned Dolly. "They cost eighty dollars apiece!"

"When you need money," explained Carter, "I find it's just as hard to
sell a hat as to eat it."

"Twenty-seven dollars and fourteen cents," repeated Dolly. She exclaimed
remorsefully: "And you started with three thousand! What did I do with
it?"

"We both had the time of our lives with it!" said Carter stoutly. "And
that's all there is to that. Post-mortems," he pointed out, "are useful
only as guides to the future, and as our future will never hold a second
three thousand dollars, we needn't worry about how we spent the first
one. No! What we must consider now is how we can grow rich quick, and
the quicker and richer, the better. Pawning our clothes, or what's left
of them, is bad economics. There's no use considering how to live from
meal to meal. We must evolve something big, picturesque, that will bring
a fortune. You have imagination; I'm supposed to have imagination, we
must think of a plan to get money, much money. I do not insist on our
plan being dignified, or even outwardly respectable; so long as it keeps
you alive, it may be as desperate as--"

"I see!" cried Dolly; "like sending mother Black Hand letters!"

"Blackmail----" began that lady's son-in-law doubtfully.

"Or!" cried Dolly, "we might kidnap Mr. Carnegie when he's walking in
the park alone, and hold him for ransom. Or"--she rushed on--"we might
forge a codicil to father's will, and make it say if mother shouldn't
like the man I want to marry, all of father's fortune must go to my
husband!"

"Forgery," exclaimed Champneys, "