in the patent medicine's worth, it
must be all that was claimed for it.

"I firmly believe," continued the little loyalist, "that the Chief has
done more good and saved more lives than all the doctors in the country.
I'd trust him further than any regular doctor I know, even if he doesn't
belong to their medical societies and all that. They're jealous of him;
that's what's the matter with them."

"Good for you!" laughed Hal, feeling his doubts melt at the fire of her
enthusiasm. "You're a good rooter for the business."

"So's the whole shop. I guess your father is the most popular employer
in Worthington. Have you decided to come into the business, Mr.
Surtaine?"

"Do you think I'd make a valuable employee, Miss Milly?" he bantered.

But to Milly Neal the subject of the Certina factory admitted of no
jocularity. She took him under advisement with a grave and quaint
dubiety.

"Have you ever worked?"

"Oh, yes; I'm not wholly a loafer."

"For a living, I mean."

"Unfortunately I've never had to."

"How old are you?"

"Twenty-five."

"I don't believe I'd want you in my department, if it was up to me," she
pronounced.

"Do you think I wouldn't be amenable to your stern discipline?"

Still she refused to meet him on his ground of badinage. "It isn't
that. But I don't think you'd be interested enough to start in at the
bottom and work up."

"Perhaps you're right, Miss Neal," said Hal, a little startled by the
acuteness of her judgment, and a little piqued as well. "Though you
condemn me to a life of uselessness on scant evidence."

She went scarlet. "Oh, please! You know I didn't mean that. But you seem
too--too easy-going, too--"

"Too ornamental to be useful?"

Suddenly she stamped her foot at him, flaming into a swift exasperation.
"You're laughing at me!" she accused. "I'm going back to my work. I
won't stay and be made fun of." Then, in another and rather a dismayed
tone, "Oh, I'm forgetting about your being the Chief's son."

Hal jumped to his feet. "Please promise to forget it when next we meet,"
he besought her with winning courtesy. "You've been a kind little friend
and adviser. And I thank you for what you have said."

"Not at all," she returned lamely, and walked away, her face still
crimson.

Returning to the executive suite, the young scion found his father
immersed in technicalities of copy with the second advertising writer.

"Sit down, Boyee," said he. "I'll be through in a few mi