"I should hardly call you a marrying man," he observed.

"Perfectly right, my friend! Sister Theresa was considered

a possible match for my grandfather in my

youth. She and I are hardly contemporaries. And the

other lady with the fascinating algebraic climax to her

name,-she, too, is impossible; it seems that I can't get

the money by marrying her. I'd better let her take it.

She's as poor as the devil, I dare say."

"I imagine not. The Evanses are a wealthy family,

in spots, and she ought to have some money of her own

Advertisement..

if her aunt doesn't coax it out of her for educational

schemes."

"And where on the map are these lovely creatures to

be found?"

"Sister Theresa's school adjoins your preserve; Miss

Devereux has I think some of your own weakness for

travel. Sister Theresa is her nearest relative, and she

occasionally visits St. Agatha's-that's the school."

"I suppose they embroider altar-cloths together and

otherwise labor valiantly to bring confusion upon Satan

and his cohorts. Just the people to pull the wool over

the eyes of my grandfather!"

Pickering smiled at my resentment.

"You'd better give them a wide berth; they might

catch you in their net. Sister Theresa is said to have

quite a winning way. She certainly plucked your grandfather."

"Nuns in spectacles, the gentle educators of youth

and that sort of thing, with a good-natured old man for

their prey. None of them for me!"

"I rather thought so," remarked Pickering,-and he

pulled his watch from his pocket and turned the stem

with his heavy fingers. He was short, thick-set and

sleek, with a square jaw, hair already thin and a close-clipped

mustache. Age, I reflected, was not improving

him.

I had no intention of allowing him to see that I was

irritated. I drew out my cigarette case and passed it

across the table, "After you! They're made quite specially for me in

Madrid."

"You forget that I never use tobacco in any form."

"You always did miss a good deal of the joy of living,"

I observed, throwing my smoking match into his

waste-paper basket, to his obvious annoyance. "Well,

I'm the bad boy of the story-books; but I'm really sorry

my inheritance has a string tied to it. I'm about out

of money. I suppose you wouldn't advance me a few

thousands on my expectations-"

"Not a cent," he declared, with quite unnecessary

vigor; and I laughed again, remembering that in my

old appraisement of him, generosity had not been represented

in large figures. "It's not in keeping with

your grandfather's wishes that I should do so. You

must have spent a good bit of money in your tiger-hunting

exploits," he added.




Most Popular