For Money.—Chapters IX-XI [pp. 241-254]

8br Money.
away on a worthless man as so many of your
sort do."
She shook her head, and over her face
there spread, not a blush, but a sort of light
that seemed to rise in her eyes and overflow.
Louise sat silent and absorbed as she and
her husband drove home. She did not notice when he spoke once or twice, but she
was roused from her abstraction as the carriage stopped under the porte cochdre before
her home.
"This rain is good for the wheat, I know,"
said Mr. Waring as he unlocked the door,
"but it isn't good for me. It never occurred
to me that it had got to rain all winter when
we decided to live here. I'll look up a house
in town tomorrow. Don't you like the idea?"
For she was standing in the dim hall looking
at him with appealing eyes.
"Oh yes," she answered mechanically.
"To leave here and be where there are other people, somebody to talk to about your
dress and the theater, and never about what
you think, and forget it yourself. Marion,
tell me," as he looked at her a little bewildered, "tell me truly; I must know, and
don't be afraid to say the exact truth.
Would you have dismissed Harry from the
bank if I-if we hadn't been married?"
"What in the world "- began Mr. Waring
in amazement. "Why,mydear child, that had
nothing to do with my business affairs. There
happened to be a vacancy, and I was looking for a reliable man to fill it. I heard of
your brother by chance, and liked what I
heard, and in talking with him I found he
was exactly the man I wanted. What set
your poor little brain puzzling over that?"
She shook her head without speaking. If
Harry could have gone on just the same without her marriage, one great justification for
it had fallen away.
"Don't talk about your having refused me,
my girl," said Mr. Waring, throwing his arm
around her. "I can't imagine it now. You
are the light of my eyes, and things couldn't
be any different."
He kissed her fondly, and they went up
the wide staircase together; but his last sentence haunted her all day long and for many
days. "Things couldn't be any different."
Ah, but they should have been.
Mr. Waring left his request for a house in
the hands of a proper agent, but felt a slight
misgiving that all would not be right unless
Mrs. Valentine were consulted; so, in all
the rain, which had not lulled once in the
twenty-four hours, he repaired to her and
explained what he wanted.
She always knew everybody's whereabouts
and plans, and immediately suggested that
the DeWitt Jacksons were going to New
York for the winter, and from there to Europe
in the spring, as soon as they could let their
house furnished. She greatly approved and
applauded Mr. Waring's resolution.
"It's just the house for you," she added.
"Beautiful lower floors for entertaining, music room, and everything."
"I want to see that music room," observed Mr. Waring. "Most people find a
small, uncomfortable, dark room, without a
fire-place, shove a piano in there, and call it
a music room. That isn't my idea; and if
Mrs. De Witt Jackson has stuffed her music
room with cushions and curtains, and whatever you call those things they hang over
the doors now, why they've just got to come
down."
Mrs. Valentine made no answer to this
outburst. Music always sent her to sleep,
and she never went to any public musical
entertainment except when "thewhole town"
went, and it would be a social crime not to
be seen there. So she only said:
"You had better have Louise send out
cards for a reception as soon as you get settled. I thought it was a great mistake on
your part to go over to San Manuel for the
winter. Nobody can call on her over there,
and she wants to form a circle, of course.
However, there isn't much harm done yet.
The winter doesn't really begin until after
the New Year, and you haven't lost anything.
But it's high time you began; and you see
De Witt Jackson as soon as you can about
the house."
The next step was for Louise to like the
house, which, upon inspection, satisfied Mr.
Waring, subject to weeding out the music
248
[March,