Yet some twenty minutes later, Mr. Woods, preparing
for luncheon in the privacy of his chamber, gave a
sudden exclamation. Then he sat down and rumpled
his hair thoroughly.
“Good Lord!” he groaned; “I’d
forgotten all about that damned money! Oh, you
ass!—you abject ass! Why, she’s
one of the richest women in America, and you’re
only a fifth-rate painter with a paltry thousand or
so a year! You marry her!—why, I
dare say she’s refused a hundred better men
than you! She’d think you were mad!
Why, she’d think you were after her money!
She—oh, she’d only think you a precious
cheeky ass, she would, and she’d be quite right.
You are an ass, Billy Woods! You ought
to be locked up in some nice quiet stable, where your
heehawing wouldn’t disturb people. You need
a keeper, you do!”
He sat for some ten minutes, aghast. Afterward
he rose and threw back his shoulders and drew a deep
breath.
“No, we aren’t an ass,” he addressed
his reflection in the mirror, as he carefully knotted
his tie. “We’re only a poor chuckle-headed
moth who’s been looking at a star too long.
It’s a bright star, Billy, but it isn’t
for you. So we’re going to be sensible now.
We’re going to get a telegram to-morrow that
will call us away from Selwoode. We aren’t
coming back any more, either. We’re simply
going to continue painting fifth-rate pictures, and
hoping that some day she’ll find the right man
and be very, very happy.”
Nevertheless, he decided that a blue tie would look
better, and was very particular in arranging it.
At the same moment Margaret stood before her mirror
and tidied her hair for luncheon and assured her image
in the glass that she was a weak-minded fool.
She pointed out to herself the undeniable fact that
Billy, having formerly refused to marry her—oh,
ignominy!—seemed pleasant-spoken enough,
now that she had become an heiress. His refusal
to accept part of her fortune was a very flimsy device;
it simply meant he hoped to get all of it. Oh,
he did, did he!
Margaret powdered her nose viciously.
She saw through him! His honest bearing
she very plainly perceived to be the result of consummate
hypocrisy. In his laughter her keen ear detected
a hollow ring; and his courteous manner she found,
at bottom, mere servility. And finally she demonstrated—to
her own satisfaction, at least—that his
charm of manner was of exactly the, same sort that
had been possessed by many other eminently distinguished
criminals.
How did she do this? My dear sir, you had best
inquire of your mother or your sister or your wife,
or any other lady that your fancy dictates. They
know. I am sure I don’t.
And after it all—
“Oh, dear, dear!” said Margaret; “I
do wish he didn’t have such nice eyes!”
On the way to luncheon Mr. Woods came upon Adele Haggage
and Hugh Van Orden, both of whom he knew, very much
engrossed in one another, in a nook under the stairway.
To Billy it seemed just now quite proper that every
one should be in love; wasn’t it—after
all—the most pleasant condition in the
world? So he greeted them with a semi-paternal
smile that caused Adele to flush a little.
