Mr. Lloyd Pryor thought very deeply after he read Mrs. Richie's
letter. He sat in his office and smoked and reflected. And as he
reflected his face brightened. It was a handsome face, with a mouth
that smiled easily. His heavy-lidded eyes behind astonishingly thick
and curling lashes were blue; when he lifted them the observer felt a
slight shock, for they were curiously motionless; generally, however,
the heavy lids drooped, lazily good-humored. He read Mrs. Richie's
letter and tapped the edge of his desk with strong, white fingers.
"Nothing could be better," he said.
Then suddenly he decided that he would go to Old Chester and say so in
person. "I suppose I ought to go, anyhow; I haven't been there for six
weeks. Yes; this child is just what she needs."
And that was how it came about that when he went home he pulled his
daughter Alice's pretty ear and said he was going away that night. "I
shall take the ten-o'clock train," he said.
His girl--a pleasant, flower-like young creature--scolded him
affectionately. "I wish you wouldn't take so many journeys. Promise to
be careful; I worry about you when I'm not with you to take care of
you," she said, in her sweet, anxious young voice. Her father,
smiling, promised prudence, and for the mere joy of watching her let
her pack his bag, lecturing him as she did so about his health. "Now
that you have undertaken all this extra business of the Pryor-Barr
people, you owe it to your stockholders to be careful of your health,"
she told him, refusing to notice his smile when he solemnly agreed
with her.
"What would happen to the Company if anything happened to you?" she
insisted, rubbing her soft cheek against his.
"Ruin, of course."
But she would not laugh. "And what would happen to me?"
"Ah, well, that's a different matter," he admitted, and kissed her and
bade her be careful. "What would happen to me if anything happened
to you?" he teased.
She hung about him, brooding over him like a little mother dove with a
hundred questions. "Are you going anywhere except to Mercer?"
"Well, yes; possibly."
"Where?"
"Oh, to a place called Old Chester."
"Who are you going to see there?"
"Nobody you know, Gas-bag! I never heard of such curiosity!"
"Ah, but I like to think about you when you are away, and know just
where you are and what you are doing every minute of the time."