in and again, and every time
have only done harm."

"How?"

"She won't--she is so suspicious. Now, last winter, Weston Curtis was
sending her flowers and--and, oh, all that sort of thing, and so I invited
him to dinner several times, and always put him next Constance, and tried
to help him in other ways, until she--well, what do you think that girl
did?"

Mrs. Ferguson's interest led her to drop her outstretched hand. "Requested
you not to?" she asked.

"Not one word did she have the grace to say to me, Josie, but she wrote to
him, and asked him not to send her any more flowers! Just think of it."

"Then that's why he went to India."

"Yes. Of course if she had come and told me she didn't care for him, I
never would have kept on inviting him; but she is so secretive it is
impossible to tell what she is thinking about. I never dreamed that she
was conscious that I was trying to--to help her; and I have always been so
discreet that I think she never would have been if Mr. Durant hadn't begun
to joke about it. Only guess, darling, what he said to me once right
before her, just as I thought I was getting her interested in young
Schenck!"

"I can't imagine."

"Oh, it was some of his Wall Street talk about promoters of trusts always
securing options on the properties to be taken in, before attempting a
consolidation, or something of that sort. I shouldn't have known what he
meant if the boys hadn't laughed and looked at Constance. And then Jack
made matters worse by saying that my interest would be satisfied with
common stock, but Constance would only accept preferred for hers. Men do
blurt things out so--and yet they assert that we women haven't tongue
discretion. No, dear, with them about it's perfectly useless for me to do
so much as lift a finger to marry Constance off, let alone her own
naturally distrustful nature."

"Well, then, can't you get some one to do it for you--some friend of
hers?"

"I don't believe there is a person in the world who could influence
Constance as regards marriage," moaned Mrs. Durant. "Don't think that I
want to sacrifice her, dear; but she really isn't happy
herself--for--well--she is a stepdaughter, you know--and so can never
quite be the same in the family life; and now that she has tired of
society, she really doesn't find enough to do to keep busy. Constance
wanted to go into the Settlement work, but her father wouldn't hear of
it--and really, Josie, every one would be happie