LYN C IT S DAUGHTER LEONARD MERRICK FOWLKK'8 Book.dl. * Stttla Montgomery. o LYNCH'S DAUGHTER Betty, you will be one of the richest girls on earth kings and queens will envy you! [Page 250.] LYNCH'S DAUGHTER BY LEONARD MERRICK NEW YORK THE McCLURE COMPANY MCMVIII Copyright , rpo8, by The McCIure Company Published, October, 1908 Copyright, 1907, by Leonard Merrick Copyright, 1908, by The Curtis Publishing Company STACK ANNEX LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS Betty, you will be one of the richest girls on earth kings and queens will envy you ! Frontispiece FACING PAGE I want you to ask me to be your wife. 12 " Here's the ring," she muttered, as he lagged back. 190 "Yes, madam," she said huskily. 218 The next time you hope to cheat a woman because she hasn't her husband with her, don't choose an American ! 280 THE HOUSE OF LYNCH THOUGH he had resolved to avoid her, he was there after all they were sitting in the conservatory. " Well, what do you think of a New York dinner dance, Mr. Keith?" she said. She bore a name that stank in the nostrils of the world; her father was the devastating trust magnate, the debaucher of politics, the infamous multi-millionaire Jordan B. Lynch. " Mrs. Waldehast is giving me a novel experience one more." " Is it so different from what you call ' small-and- earlies ' in England? " " I haven't been to many; I'm not a Society per- sonage, Miss Lynch." " Artists don't think much of Society, do they? " " Some think of it more than they do of art. I don't mean your artists here, of course, I don't know enough about them, I mean our swells at home." " I've never grasped the distinction between your 3 4 THE HOUSE OF LYNCH ' swells ' and our ' dudes ' I'm not sure if I know what a swell is." " Well, I'm probably the only person you know who isn't one." "Mr. Keith," exclaimed the girl, " why will you always address me as if we were residing in different planets? " " Merely because we are. Mrs. Waldehast has been wonderfully nice to me; but this is the only smart house I have been to in New York, and I should never have met you at any mutual friend's in London." He hesitated, and then, as she gave no sign of understanding him, went on, " It's quite as caddish to harp on one's pecuniary drawbacks as on one's pecuniary advantages, but you may have gathered by this time that er that I that " " I have ' gathered,' " she smiled. " Thank you," said Keith. " I might have known your intelligence couldn't fail." " Well? " " That's all. Excepting that I'm afraid I have not always addressed you quite as you say. You see you come here a great deal, and so do I, and I've almost forgotten things in moments." " Well, forget them now, please. Do you know I think you're horrid I ask you to talk, and you just speak! " THE HOUSE OF LYNCH 5 " You're very kind. What do you ask me to talk about? " ." Well, what did you talk about to your friends? " He laughed. " Oh, on the planet that I mustn't remember, we talk about our difficulties when we aren't romancing about our prices. To you, Miss Lynch, we should talk Greek. The dominant ad- jective is ' hard up/ ' " But you have some good times? " " Oh yes. At our swaggerest functions those given by fellows who have more than one room men even bring their wives. And the wives bring the babies, and put them to sleep on the host's bed. They don't keep a nurse, and they couldn't leave the babies behind alone. Some of the Greek? " She denied it radiantly: " No, that is rather hu- morous." " Y-e-s; I'm told the humour soon wears thin." " Well, I'm very glad that Dardy saw that picture of yours when she was in London she's enthusiastic about your portrait of her! So am I; it's splendid. You know, she wondered whether you'd come over when Mr. Waldehast wrote she didn't know but what it was a lot to ask." " It's a very usual thing to ask. And it isn't always as complimentary as we want to think. A woman often sees a half-length somewhere, and sends the man a 6 THE HOUSE OF LYNCH commission, because she appreciated his model. Lots of our men come over to paint people they have never seen. It's rather a nervous journey." " Why, yes, I suppose so the people may be per- fectly hideous. You must have been glad to see Dardy? " " I was. The best thing to be said of portrait painting, as a rule, is that it's the only education . anybody is paid to take it teaches you to search for individuality. A portrait isn't made by paint- ing features you have to paint the character behind them." " Not everyone would say ' thank you * for that," she remarked. " Quite so and not everyone would be satisfied with my portrait of him. But it doesn't matter, because I don't want to paint portraits. It's awful work! A portrait painter, nine times out of ten, has to choose between being an artist and a cour- tier." " I think you'd be very unwise to talk like that," she said sharply; "it's bad business! I've told you so before." " Yes, I know." He flushed. " I suppose I'm not a business man. It was stupid of me to say it." " No, you're not to think that; you'll take that back, please! It's how I want you to talk to me THE HOUSE OF LYNCH 7 as you really feel! But I do caution you against talking like it to other people. You ought to make a heap of dollars in New York if you're smart." " Oh, I shouldn't have declined any commissions just now in fact, I've stayed on here in the hope of getting some." " You did decline one," she said; " I asked you to paint me, and you made excuses. Was that the rea- son you thought I'd want you to be a courtier? " " I think I begged you to let me paint you, didn't I? I was very eager to." " You offered to make a sketch of me as a gift that wasn't what I wanted. Anyhow, whether you hate portraits or not, you ought to pretend to gush about them. Dardy's picture should do you good here if you take the right tone. You know, Mr. Keith, I'm ages older than you." " Yes. I'm thirty-three; I suppose you're twenty." " It's sweet of you, but I'm more. And I didn't mean in years, I meant in Well, you know what I meant. Do you think I'm horribly worldly, Mr. Keith?" " Am I meant to tell you the truth? " " Right away! I can suffer." ' Then you've amazed me, in moments, by your umvorldliness. That was what interested me you were so unlike what I thought you would be." 8 THE HOUSE OF LYNCH "What was that?" " I thought what a fraud it was that you had such a such a I'm bound to be blatant such a beauti- ful face, for I didn't for an instant suppose that you would have a beautiful mind/' " You are different from the others," she mur- mured. " And don't you think it a fraud any more? " " No." "Do go ahead!" " I only think it a pity that your life doesn't give a chance to your soul." Her eyes were attentive, puzzled. " Religion? " she hazarded. " The religion of ' one who loves his fellow-men.' I think that everybody ought to do all he can for humanity. Of course the influence of most of us doesn't show outside our homes, but wealth is a wide power, and art is a wide power the painter speaks in every language I don't think one is entitled to fritter away either one's wealth or one's art." His voice gained courage. " You just lectured me for saying I didn't want to go on with portraits; I don't want to go on with them, because I hope and pray that it's in me to paint something that will say more." " You told me the other day you were ' delighted ' when you got Mr. Waldehast's letter? " THE HOUSE OF LYNCH 9 " I was delighted because the commission was a valuable one. And I've done my best to deserve it; I put in as much work as Mrs. Waldehast would al- low and a good deal more than would have been discreet if she weren't a very patient woman or at least a very amiable one. But a portrait's interest is generally limited to the domestic circle and to other artists. Technic alone never made a great work of art. The goal of art is the soul of the world the highest art illumines a more inspiring truth than the character of Mr. So-and-so." " What kind of pictures do you do? " " I like the symbolic school best, but any subject that uplifts is a great one." " Supposing they don't pay so well as Mr. So-and- so? That's possible, isn't it? " " It's much more than possible; but my chief aim isn't to make money. The point is, that whatever advantages anyone may have ought to be directed to the noblest ends. It doesn't matter what one's medium is whether one is a painter, or a priest, or a statesman, or a private citizen one ought to put forth one's best for the benefit of one's country. That's one's duty to one's country! It's possible also that I may prove to have nothing but the ideal, that the force mayn't be there. I daresay I sounded vain you wouldn't think me vain if you knew how io THE HOUSE OF LYNCH frightfully I distrust myself; I often think that any- body on earth could paint as well as I do if he took as much pains. I've no facility; other men can knock things off in a day that take me a week. I may fail and I shall be wretched, because I know that, with me, it's art first and patriotism afterwards; but I shall have been a good Englishman for all that. And I'd rather fail by being true to my con- science than make a popular success by being false. Am I a bore? " " No, but I haven't climbed up there yet." " I'm grateful you didn't pretend that you had. It's where most people either lie or laugh." She frowned. " Do you confide in most peo- ple? " " I never confided in any other woman in my life and in very few men." " Oh," her glance approved; " I'll get there in time! You shall talk to me about it again." " I'm afraid I shan't have the chance; I was going to tell you I'm going back sooner than I in- tended." " Why? " It was uttered a second late, but the tone was faultless. " I think it would be as well." " Surely New York is the place for you to be in just now? " THE HOUSE OF LYNCH n " I think on the whole it would be as well to go back," he said. " I'm sorry you have to go." " Thank you," said Keith in his throat. " 7'm very sorry, but I must. I shall often think of my trip to America." After the least pause, she said reproachfully, " I hope the prospect is a very brilliant one? Of course if your business is so urgent, you can't be expected to neglect it for the sake of your friends." " I'm not leaving for business reasons," he ac- knowledged. " Is there someone in England who's so sweet that you can't bear to be away from her? " " I think that you know there isn't." Her head was bent; she tapped time with her fan to the waltz of " Sammy " in the ballroom. " If you aren't running after a girl, I guess you must be running away from one? . . . Isn't that weak?" " No necessary. It's quite impossible that I could ever marry that girl, and I've got to recon- cile myself to the fact; I should never reconcile my- self to it while I went on seeing her. I can't afford to feel as I've been feeling lately I've got my work to think about. So the sooner I go the better. I'm not sacrificing any chance by going don't imagine 12 THE HOUSE OF LYNCH that! no frenzied admirers of my work will miss me." " Perhaps the girl will miss you, though," sug- gested Miss Lynch. " I haven't the conceit to think so; I don't want to think so." The pearls and lilies on her breast rose faster. "If I were you I would! " " It's out of the question for me to propose to her, or to say that I care for her," he insisted thickly. " If she likes you, she won't think it out of the question. . . . Aren't you going to tell me who it is you're running away from? " He didn't speak. His mouth was set hard. " Is it me? " she whispered. " Yes." She raised her head and looked at him. There was nearly a line of " Sammy " before her voice came " Mr. Keith, I have been called the * proudest girl in New York/ but I'm going to say an immodest thing right here." The lips trembled, and he saw the throbbing of her throat. " I want you to ask me to be your wife." He grabbed both her hands and bowed his face on them. " I can't! " he said. "You've got to." She smiled victoriously. " Betty Lynch doesn't let her millions spoil her happiness." I want you to ask me to be your wife THE HOUSE OF LYNCH 13 " You don't understand. I can't, it's impossible! " " You're not married? " "Married? No! But I couldn't give you a home that you'd live in." " And I don't let your foolishness spoil my hap- piness either, that's just why I said what I did! We need not be anxious about the home." "I couldn't stand that, I wouldn't do it!" " I fear I have proposed to you," she mur- mured, dimpling. " It would be too bad if I were refused." "Oh, my dear," said Keith desperately, " I hon- our and adore you for what you said! I'd give twenty years of my life to marry you. But I can't. To begin with, your father would, of course, forbid the engagement." " My father would never forbid me anything." " Then he would give you a million or so, and I should be asked to share it. And I couldn't! " She drew her hands free. " Do you mean," she said coldly, " that you would rather give me up than swallow your pride? I swallowed some for you just now." "It isn't a question of 'pride'; I'd put pride in the gutter for you." "What else is it? It isn't love. I don't admire it. It's talking like a man in a book." 14 THE HOUSE OF LYNCH " Don't ! " stammered Keith. " If you knew what I'm feeling! " " I think I do know you feel more esteem for yourself than for me. No man who was really fond of a girl would consent to lose her because she had more dollars than he had. Not if she were as rich as I, and he were as poor as a tramp! No, human nature doesn't do those things. If he were without a meal, if he hadn't a cent in his pocket or shoes to his feet, and she said what / have said to you, he would try his best to marry her if he loved her. It would be his duty, and her due." " And so would I," gasped Keith, " if that were all!" " If it were ' all ' ? " Her startled eyes widened at him pitiably, she turned dead-white. " Oh ! you mean you . . . don't approve of my father's meth- ods? You mean you would think it ... a dis- grace? " " For Heaven's sake! I couldn't live on his money, leave it at that! I can't talk about it. But I love you, I love you, Betty." " Love? You have thrown my father's reputation in my face, you have told me I am too dishonest for you." "You? You? Oh, my darling the money, not you!" THE HOUSE OF LYNCH 15 " It is the money that keeps me," she said pain- fully. " Oh, I know what they say about the Trust I read! I hear of the people ruined, and the broken homes, and and it doesn't make me feel good when I think about it. But I spend such money. It is the money that buys my frocks, and candies, and flowers; it is the money that pays for the food I eat and the house I live in. If you care for me as you wish me to believe, and yet would rather lose me than let my father make us happy, then you are telling me the money is so shameful that I am a thief to take it." " I tell you I adore you. I want you as I never wanted anything else on earth. I don't reproach you, I don't, I don't! You were brought up to take it, and and, besides, what else could you have done? But /'m different I'm used to roughing it, and I've got my work and if I were weak enough to profit by a tyranny that has horrified and revolted me ever since I understood what it meant, I should be a cur, and our ' happiness ' would be no happiness, it would be hell." Miss Lynch rose haughtily. " I had thought that to say to any man what 7 have said must be as great a humiliation as a girl could know; my affront to myself is bearable compared with the indignities I have suffered from you" 16 THE HOUSE OF LYNCH " Betty," he cried, " my whole income in a lucky year hasn't been half of what you spent on the candies and the flowers; but I'm getting on, I'll do better for you one day if you'll only be patient, and I love you, I love you, you might wipe your boots on my heart! You may think me a madman for asking, but I'd worship you will you marry me on what I've got? " " Mr. Keith, you will please take me back to the room," she said. II IN his palace in Fifth Avenue, in his splendid study lined with books, none of which he had ever read, an old man sat awaiting Betty's return from the dance. This was Jordan B. Lynch. He had struggled as " Bill Lynch." Towards middle age he had adopted the " Jordan " and curtailed the " Bill." He bent smoking moodily over the fire. It was nearly midnight, and a desk in the room was heaped with the letters that had come to his private address during the day. There were desperate letters from men whom the Trust and its radiating forces had broken; frantic entreaties from destitute women and girls whose husbands, or fathers, or brothers his operations had decoyed to disgrace or death; indict- ments from philanthropists, warnings from clergymen, who threatened his rapacity with Heaven's wrath. Lynch, however, had not opened any of the letters, nor would any of them be laid before him. At the beginning such things had disturbed him. Later they had angered him. It was the law of na- 17 i8 THE HOUSE OF LYNCH ture for the weak to suffer; why abuse him for it? he demanded. Finally, they had come to minister to his pride. These daily budgets of appeals for mercy, these admonitions overflowing the wastepaper-baskets were an emblem of his conquest; they testified to the triumph of his career, more than his magnificent library that had no literary interest for him, and his famous pictures that he never looked at. As a burden on indigent parents in the black country, he had been a wage-earner as a child; as an emigrant he had been tortured by the sight of small chances that he was too poor to seize. He had hoarded, scraped, stinted his stomach for years and been robbed of his first five hundred dollars. He had rinsed glasses behind a bar on a Mississippi steamer, had wrung a bare living from the earth in California; had planned, climbed, fallen; set his teeth and sweated; climbed again; prospected, speculated, taken, with undaunted eyes, the risk of being dashed to the bottom once more. And, by the grace of grit, he was Jordan B. Lynch, who had the world by its throat and the world might squeak! Poverty prolonged grim, gaunt, grinding poverty brutalises. Of all the cant acclaimed, none is rot- tener than the pretence that poverty ennobles char- acter. But to-night, as he bent smoking over the fire, the THE HOUSE OF LYNCH 19 weazen old man was not thinking of his conquest, he was thinking of his children. He had been fifty when he married, already a men- ace to two continents; and when a son came, the pi- ratical financier who hewed his road through the mis- fortunes of a multitude had taken an innocent delight in providing for his boy a plenitude of the pleasures that he himself had missed. It was the father's caprice, not the mother's, that converted a spacious nursery into a range of mountains, on which bears, formidable in real bearskin, roamed as large as life after one turned keys in them. Jordan B. Lynch's little heir, with a pop-gun, was entertained for an hour by try- ing to hit them before their clockwork ran down. Of course there were other nurseries. One of them con- tained an electrical boat which carried the listless child across a painted sea, while he tossed blunted spears at mechanical whales. The boy had been bored very young, but to the man the view of such follies had yielded a permanent sat- isfaction his own bitter childhood, which he had always remembered with resentment, ceased to chafe him like a bad debt. The advent of a daughter had been a disappointment, for he had wanted another son ; but after the death of his wife it was Betty who be- came the dearer child. At first she charmed him more because she resembled her mother ; it gratified him that 20 THE HOUSE OF LYNCH his girl looked of gentle birth. Howard's features were rough-cast, like his own. Later she was his favourite because she showed him the more affection. To his daughter his profusion was even more ebullient than to his son. Yet he never said " no " to the boy. His children must have everything the luxury, the education, the fun that had been withheld from him! Even because his own youth had been so sordid, he found a covert fascination in their extravagance. When he saw the bills, he smiled wryly, recalling the ferocity of life to himself at their age. The secretaries who corrected his English had been much diverted to see the financial leader engrossed by the lad's first dress suit; Lynch was reflecting that the first dress suit he had put on himself had been ordered when he was forty. In his commercial aspect, corrupt and ruthless, he was a tender father ; and a genius in finance, he lacked foresight in his home. He had lived to deplore his indulgence of Howard, with the quintessence of re- morse which many, who are untroubled by a sin, may suffer for a stupidity. The drollery of having a man of fashion for a son had long ceased to tickle the old adventurer. The denseness of Lynch junior to the fi- nancial alphabet was a prank of nature's neither of them was to be blamed for that, continuously galling as the senior found it ; the uppishness might pass ; the THE HOUSE OF LYNCH 21 blank deficiency of purpose might have permitted op- timism in a parent. But Lynch had docketed his son " worthless " when he realised that the young man dis- sipated without zest; a profligacy of vehemence would have left hope of reform, a profligacy of lassitude left none. He had made no illusions for himself the crowd who justly reviled him would have been glad to read his thoughts his only son was a failure! But there had remained Betty Betty, whose Fifth Avenue tone was the only music he appreciated his girl, who wore her frocks like one of the Four Hundred ! The surviv- ing ambitions of his fatherhood were absorbed by her. He had hoped to see her bearing a great name, had dreamed of it. He would give her to no illustrious pauper who meant to scatter her millions and neglect her; she should choose a noble who was rich already, one who would love her honestly, and whom she'd love. He had imagined the ancestral home, the crest on her carriage, a score of childish details that were sweet to picture because they meant the exaltation of Betty. And now Betty had as good as told him she was fond of some artist! The street bell sounded, and Lynch opened the study door, in the thought that the girl had returned ; but it was Howard who had rung, having forgotten his latchkey. 22 THE HOUSE OF LYNCH " Hello," he said languidly, seeing Lynch still up, "you're late!" " Hello," said Lynch, " you re early! " It was the first time they had met that day. " I know ; why haven't you turned in? " " I'm waiting for Betty." "Where's she gone?" " The Waldehasts'. She expected you to take her." " Me? I never said I'd go, did I? " He lounged into the room, and lit a cigarette. Though he took infinite pains in dressing himself, he did no credit to his tailor ; and the fashion which ordained that his sandy hair should be parted in the centre and plastered behind his projecting ears was not becoming to him. " What's the news ? " " W-e-11, there is the news of your * pastoral dinner ' last night," snarled Lynch. " Oh ? " He put his hands in his trouser-pockets and smiled impudently over his father's head. " I see that the restaurant was ' converted into a meadow.' ' " The likeness wasn't very faithful, but that was the notion," drawled the young man. " The Herald says * a rivulet of champagne sparkled between banks of orchids.' ' " I hope the Day was just as picturesque. I never read it, but I have a filial interest in its circulation." THE HOUSE OF LYNCH 23 " You're very humorous," said Lynch, " very Har- vardy and brilliant! Is it indispensable at dinner in your set for the ladies to ' pick diamonds from a strawberry bed, as souvenirs ' ? " " No. That was an innovation of my own." " It was a great scheme ! " "So 7 thought. They did scramble ! I saw all the frenzy of a bargain-sale without being damaged by the crush." " You might have done so if you had been earning ten dollars a week behind a counter ! " said his father acridly. " Ah," Howard looked disconcerted ; " your repartee if I may mention it, sir is vulgar." He mixed a generous whisky-and-soda, and there was a long silence. Lynch blinked at the fire, mourn- ing mistakes. Warmed by the whisky, Howard grew facetious. " Buck up," he murmured. " I haven't broken you." " You have not broken me in dollars." " What ? Oh, in hopes. Don't be sentimental, gov- ernor; it doesn't suit you. Take it easy! If you knew how deadly dull life is, you wouldn't rag a fellow for trying to get a gleam of fun. Anyhow, I see you gave half a million to the Nixonville Institute this week ; if you can afford Institutes, you can spare me a dinner." 24 THE HOUSE OF LYNCH " My charities do good to me, they are policy." " Well, it does you good that I make a few debts. If 7 spend it while you scoop it, people won't have so much to howl about. That's policy too! You don't do my brains justice, you know. My schemes are subtle; you want to think 'em out. You ought to charge the dinner to your charity account ! " He giggled. " I take Roosevelt's point of view; he doesn't approve of for- tunes ' swollen beyond healthy limits.' Nor do I I'm doing my best to cope with a national evil." He emptied his glass, and sauntered towards the door with a nod. " Good-night." " Good-night," grunted Lynch. He hesitated. " Say, Howard ! D'ye know anything of that fellow Keith ? " "Keith?" " That artist that Betty asked to the house? He was unable to come, but I have heard her speak about him." " Oh ! No ; I've only seen him once. / don't meet him he's nothing, he's an artist, he's staying in a boarding-house. " "Is that so?" " He mentioned it himself at the Waldehasts' ; didn't seem ashamed of it, either doesn't ' know,' I suppose. Why ? " " Well, Betty is interested in him. I wondered why she had asked him home, and I taxed her with it." " What ? Do you mean she Oh, rats ! She may THE HOUSE OF LYNCH 25 have flirted with him he's all right to look at, except for his clothes; she wouldn't understand about them." " Well I guess you are correct," said Lynch, see- ing that there was nothing to be learnt. " Good-night." It was a long while before Betty came in. As she crossed the room she was almost as pale as she had been when Keith's meaning broke upon her, and the look in her eyes puzzled the old man. But his tone was innocent. " Well ? Had a good time, poppet ? " " I'm very tired, father," she said in a strained voice. " I'm going right upstairs." " I have been saving my last cigar to smoke with you. Can't you spare me five minutes ? " She stood by the mantelpiece, a hand clenched on the marble : " I have nothing to say to-night." " Howard claims that he never promised to take you he came in a while ago." "Oh?" " Anybody there ? Your friend was there, I guess ? " She nodded, with her mouth squeezed. He got up, and touched her. " He was there, and we talked, and I asked him to marry me ! " said the girl in an outburst ; and she slid crookedly into a chair, and sobbed as if she would break a blood-vessel, with her face laid on the arm. Lynch himself was scarcely less moved. Her words 26 THE HOUSE OF LYNCH dismissed his last hope. The highest expectation of his life had collapsed. " W-e-11," he said, " I guess the Queen may do these things. Don't break up like that, poppet; you've noth- ing to blush for he couldn't ask you, that's certain. I ain't going to raise Cain, you know ; if you want to marry him, you've just got to marry him, there's no doubt about it. So dry your eyes, and sit round, and I'll light that cigar see? " " I am not going to marry him," she answered, rais- ing herself. The old man stared at her speechlessly. "What?" he said at last. " He he made conditions." " How's that, he ' made conditions ' ? You offered to marry him, and he ' made conditions ' ? " " He said I must marry him on what he had got ; that he wouldn't take anything from you, not a cent ! " " Is that all ? " said Lynch, on a laugh. " Don't you fret your eyes red about that ! " " It's real, he means it. He thinks our dollars hor- rible, he said they ' revolted ' him, he said he would rather lose me than touch them. Oh, I am ashamed! He degraded me! I sat there feeling like a thief. You don't know what it was! I loved him, and I couldn't look him in the face I couldn't defend my own father. Oh, if I could have changed places with any decent THE HOUSE OF LYNCH 27 girl in New York, I might have been so happy to- night!" "Honey!" he pleaded, trembling over her, "my honey, baby don't ! " " Is it so bad as they say ? Tell me. I've been a coward, I haven't talked, but I'm not blind you must know I know. I've got to understand now, I've got to know just what I am ! " " You're one of the wealthiest girls alive," he fal- tered. " Is that good enough ? " " No ! There's not a girl clerking in this city who has been degraded as your daughter was to-night. I've got to know just what I am, I've got to know if he was justified." " Betty," said Lynch, " it is mainly for you I am working I am not piling up millions for Howard to squander them when I go. You know I have aimed at seeing you an English duchess I have sometimes even er knuckled under, in view of my ambitions for you. Don't ask me if I have justified a man in insult- ing you." " I don't want the millions if they bring me con- tempt I'm a woman, and I loved him, and I want the right to tell him that he lied ! " " Well, of course, of course he lied," said Lynch soothingly. " He doesn't know ; you say he is an artist what knowledge has he of finance? I guess he has 28 THE HOUSE OF LYNCH read a leader in the Flag and been stuffed ; why doesn't he read the Day? See here, there's not a business going, however small it may be, that hasn't got its smaller enemies: the greenhorn that has opened a little dry-goods store in a village is cursed by the pedlar, who don't need to come around there any more ; the pedlar says the greenhorn is a ' monopolist, crushing competition.' Even the pedlar is attacked there is another pedlar in the same district, who growls that the first fellow's pack is too big. Through all commercial and industrial enterprise, poppet, it is the same thing; but the larger the pack, the louder the growl." " It sounds all right," she admitted weakly ; " but then, I want to believe it ! " " You've just got to believe it. Don't you go look- ing for trouble. In this life it's every man for him- self, and the only man who pretends different is the one who's so weak-kneed that he wants somebody else to shove him along. The ' wicked monopolist ' don't monopolise selfishness. See those letters on the desk! I haven't touched them I don't hire secretaries in order to pass my day reading what don't concern me but there are two things I can tell you about them right here. They're all begging letters from strangers, who recognise that if I gave to all the beggars who write me, I'd be selling bananas on THE HOUSE OF LYNCH 29 the street; and every stranger has marked his letter ' private,' to get an advantage over the other stran- gers." " Some of them may be deserving, for all that," she said. " Have I time to sort them ? Can I neglect business while I convert myself into an investigation bureau? I do all the good I can, without being unjust to myself and my children. I made a gift of half a million to the Nixonville Institute only this week. My charities are very numerous, and they are my joy as well as my duty. Had your Mr. Keith any comments to make on my charities ? " She stirred in the chair restlessly : " No." " You're going to tell me just what he said ; I don't allow you to be insulted." " He said well, it was I who said it first : I saw what he meant when he said that he couldn't marry me. But he acknowledged that was his reason! He said he wouldn't talk about it. He said he thought the Trust revolting, that if he lived on dollars from from a source he condemned, he would be a * cur.' He wanted me to marry him on what he has." "What's that?" She gave a shrug. " Not much." "Is that all he said?" " I think that's all." 30 THE HOUSE OF LYNCH " Well, forget about him ! Have a good time. I'll send you to Europe with Howard the London sea- son'll be starting soon I'll come over myself and fix up that presentation at Court for you. There's nothing smashed. In a year you'll wonder what you saw in him and why you were so wretched." " I have never imagined I cared seriously for any- one before," she said. " It's very easy to be cynical about other people's sorrows." " As you go through life, poppet, you'll get experi- ence of a bitterer cynic than me, or any other man. That's Time. W-e-11, you know I wasn't keen on your marrying him, and I am a long way from keen to- night, but if you have set your heart on it, go ahead! Don't worry yourself over trifles; it would not be a difficult transaction to persuade a man to take an income for nothing, plus the girl he loves." " I wouldn't marry him now if he went on his knees to me ! " she said vehemently. " Besides, he meant it, I tell you, he meant every word." " I have met cranks already, but I have never met one yet who wasn't amenable to reason through his pocket." " You don't know him ! " There was a little un- conscious pride in her voice. " No, but I know human nature. . . . See here, when I made your mother's acquaintance, she hadn't THE HOUSE OF LYNCH 31 a notion who I was I had gone South incog. The rumpus had begun even then; there was some of the poppycock talked in those days that there is now. Her father had very high principles, and nothing else he had been crippled by the War; the twenty thou- sand that he left to you was all locked up in sugar at that time. He spoke to me about ' the millionaire Lynch and his methods ' as he might have spoken about the devil and all his works. But your mother was very sweet ; I liked her. So one day I said to him, ' /'m Lynch and I want to marry your daughter.' W-e-11, he adopted another view of my methods! . . . If you ask me to do so, I will smoke a cigar with Mr. Keith, and he will see that his judgment was erroneous." " ' If I ask you to do so ? ' " she said. " If you were to send for him, I could never lift my head again! I'll never speak another word to him as long as I live it doesn't matter whether I forget or not ! " She got up, and righted her hair with a pretence of composure before a mirror. " Don't you think we've stayed here late enough talking about Mr. Keith ? " Ill AFTER he left the dance, Richard Keith walked miles blindly. A few hours earlier he had meant to leave her, had been almost resigned to leaving her, but in the interval the unforeseen had happened : she had said she cared for him, he had insulted her and she was much dearer to him than she had been a few hours earlier. Before the dance he had thought that there could be nothing more impossible than for him to ask Miss Lynch to marry him. But he had asked her, and now, in spite of her repulse and his distress of mind in spite of common sense itself the hope persisted. He tried to view the marriage with her eyes, and shrank aghast from the magnitude of her sacrifice. Yet he prayed that she would make it. He wanted it not only for his sake; because he loved her he wanted it for hers. " I know about the people ruined, and the broken homes ! " The words had been hide- ous on her lips. Yes, she knew! Not the whole, not a tithe, she did not see the suicides' blood or their 3* THE HOUSE OF LYNCH 33 daughters' helplessness the victims' cries did not pierce the music in the mansions; from her carriage window she could not read the histories of Magda- lens in the street. But vaguely she knew and he hungered for her to be worthier, he yearned for her to be as noble as she looked. Alternately he wondered if he was insane to dream of her consenting, and if he would be justified in pleading to her. Could she be happy as his wife? Her sacrifice would not abate the suffering if her shame satisfied her, perhaps his appeal would be grossly selfish? But he could not think it would be selfish after what she had owned. Though in her presence he felt a pauper, he was indeed a rising man she would not starve in his arms. The last two years had brought recognition and a banking account. A balance of a few hundred pounds and Mr. Waldehast's cheque for fifteen hundred dollars repre- sented a stately monument on the road of his life. His father had been a clergyman because the Church had called to him, not because there was a living in the family; indeed, expedience had pointed in another direction. A painfully inadequate stipend had been eked out by a slender private income. The widow had invested the principal in a bubble company, and found herself penniless while the boy was at a student ho- tel in Montparnasse. He had been wrenched from 34 THE HOUSE OF LYNCH Montparnasse to enter an office in East India Ave- nue, where her brother-in-law generously paid him more than his services were worth, and ungenerously reminded him of it. From the time Keith was nine- teen until his mother died he had been bread-winner for them both, and simulated cheerfulness. If the clerk wept for the art student, he wore no mourn- ing for him, nor did he doubt that he would reach his Mistress at the end. The journey would be longer and rougher, that was all ! The widow heard no mur- murs. He was an automaton by day and an enthusi- ast by night ; the cipher in the city office laboured like a hero in the Clapham lodgings. And of course the lady thought it a pity : " He would get a much better position with his uncle if he only took more interest in the business she was speaking for his own good ! " But the inner voice was stronger. He had drawn before he could spell, drawn on his slate, on the walls of his nursery, and been punished for it, drawn on the backs of his father's sermons drawn, as many children lie, because it was an imperative and un- reasoning instinct. It had been instinct that riveted him before the Turner water-colours one day when " Art " was an unknown name, when he knew only that each separate piece of paper seemed to have caught all the light and loveliness of the world. His mother had run into the National Gallery with him, THE HOUSE OF LYNCH 35 during a visit to London, for shelter from the rain, and the child understood that she thought him a little noodle when she saw his eyes. The clerk under- stood that she thought him a fool when she saw him paint. To the average mind there is nothing sillier than genius before it is renowned. Afterwards, the renown is admired. At her death the office had been abandoned that he might have more time to study. His abject pov- erty had not been sufficiently prolonged to dull his ideals, but he had often been dinnerless and even home- less, and for years the income from his art had not equalled the salary from his clerkship. To-day, if he had not been in love with the daughter of a million- aire, he would have been elated by his pecuniary po- sition; four to five hundred a year was conspicuous, for his age. Besides, he hoped that his prices would improve much more. Although the man was too truly an artist to seek popular success at the cost of doing inferior work, he was too truly an artist to be indif- ferent to wealth. Wealth is the master-key to beauty to travel in beautiful places, to the collection of beautiful things. Keith desired riches ardently, though he put his conscience first. No, wild it might be to aspire to marry her, but not selfish, he thought, for she cared for him. Since it was for him she cared, he naturally over-estimated 36 THE HOUSE OF LYNCH the importance of her caring. Lightly as a man thinks of a girl's tenderness for any other man, he is apt to think it an imperishable influence in her life if her tenderness is for himself. Brown and Jones are always secretly amused at Robinson's fear that Miss Green will break her heart if he has to give her up : " Dear old chap, Robinson, one of the best, but his idea that he is an object of profound devotion is rather comic ! " But Brown and Jones similarly exaggerate the feelings that they have inspired in the Misses Pink and White. It is not vanity, it is faith; the desirable lover accepts the girl's own view of her emotions and the girl who doesn't imagine her love to be lifelong is not worth marrying. It was daybreak when Richard Keith re-entered the boarding-house to which he had fled dismayed after a few weeks' experience of hotel terms; and a letter from him was brought to Betty when she woke a long, remorseful, futile letter. It said everything but what she wanted to hear that he withdrew his objection. To most people it is fatally easy to feel convinced of what they wish to believe. Lynch's daughter wished to believe that her wealth was honest. Though Keith was by no means essential to her happiness, she fancied that he was, and a sentimental illusion may create quite as much ferment as an heroic love; she THE HOUSE OF LYNCH 37 was suffering violently, and it would have been hor- rible to her to think that this hurricane of hopeless- ness sprang from her attachment to an infamous for- tune. It was far nicer to believe that her father was traduced by the world and that Keith was wantonly unreasonable. She pitied herself passionately. Never in her frivo- lous life before had she wanted anything so much, and never until now had anything been denied to her. Because it was denied, she wanted it more vehemently still. She sent no answer to his letter. The impulse to assuage her pain by mortifying him with a few hurt- ful lines was very strong, but she felt that silence be- came her better ; and the thought that, on the whole, it would mortify him even more, enabled her to resist the temptation. Nor did she go to the Waldehasts' during the next few days, ardently as she desired to hear about him; so Keith contrived to see her only when she was driv- ing when he could not be certain whether he was ignored, or only overlooked. However, she wrote ask- ing Mrs. Waldehast to go to her. They had been friends since their schooldays, and Dardy Waldehast rustled in upon her promptly. " Now, I'm just dying with curiosity," she said, " so you've got to tell me everything ! " 38 THE HOUSE OF LYNCH " I don't know what you mean," said Betty. " I've been trying to pump Keith, but I can't get anything out of him." " Mr. Keith ? " Her tone implied that the reference to him was irrelevant. " Oh, he hasn't sailed then ? I thought he was leaving New York ? " " He is very much in New York at present he has been living in my rocker, waiting for you to come in." "Did he say so?" " Not in words. What's the trouble with him, Betty ? I thought you meant it ? " " So I did mean it ; you know very well I meant it ! Dardy, I'm miserable; he has treated me abominably. He says he says he wouldn't take a cent with me! What do you think of that ? " Dardy Waldehast's eyes widened. " You don't mean to say that's what you're worrying about ? " she asked. " That sort of thing looks very pretty, but it's not made to wash. He couldn't help it, even if he wanted to, you know that very well he hasn't got anything." " He insists that we should live on what he has got, anyhow. If you think he's trying to fool me, we can't talk. I have refused him ; I am never going to see him any more." "But, you flat! he had to say it; he couldn't have THE HOUSE OF LYNCH 39 proposed to you if he hadn't said it. I don't know where your wits have gone, really ! " " You don't understand. He won't take it because he's a crank; he thinks the Trust is wicked. Oh, he made his reasons perfectly plain my feelings were of no consequence! Of course he doesn't know anything about it he has probably been misled by a leader in the Flag. He says he wouldn't touch our dollars. He wants me to do without them, and ' give my soul a chance ' he's strong on my soul, my food doesn't matter! He expects me to sacrifice all my comfort to his crazy notions. I never heard anything so selfish in my life." "Well, I should say!" exclaimed Mrs. Waldehast. " Is that so ? And I've been feeling real bad for him, feeding him up with tea and candies! . . . Does it weigh much, Bet ? " " Yes ; I never liked a man that way before. I'd have done anything for him and he treats me like this ! I suppose it's life as soon as a girl cares for a man really, he makes her suffer. They're only fit to be flirted with and made game of. I'd rather have mar- ried him than all the dukes in the peerage and he doesn't mind if I don't have enough to eat! " " Have you told your father ? " " Yes. Of course he doesn't want me to marry him, but he'd let me I might have had a heavenly life if it 40 THE HOUSE OF LYNCH hadn't been for him I My father offered to talk to him, but I can't permit that making myself so cheap. Be- sides, it wouldn't do any good. He wants me to go to Europe with Howard." "Who your father does? Are you going?" " What's the use of that ? I'll never get over it as long as I live in Europe or anywhere else. It has broken my heart, I could cry my eyes out." Her voice quivered. " What shall I do, Dardy ? I'm so fond of him. Tisn't as if he were silly all through; it's only just this one point he's as sensible as anybody else about most things." " I wish I hadn't had him at the house so much ! " " Oh, it's my own fault I saw where I was going. I could have pulled up in time if I had wanted to. Now it's too late ! I'll never care for another man as I cared for him. I feel I feel about him just the way we used to talk before we put our hair up, Dardy." Mrs. Waldehast nodded. " Still, of course, that wouldn't last anyhow," she said. " Even if you marry your romance, you lose it I mean, your husband's quite different from the fellow you used to gaze at the moon about." " I expect he's more like it than the other fellows, all the same ! " " I don't know ; Hal's all right, and I'm quite happy with him, but I do sometimes wonder what became of THE HOUSE OF LYNCH 41 the Hal I got married to. I don't meet him. I guess there's a bad fairy that flies away with our bride- grooms while we're dreaming on the honeymoon and when we wake, we just find husbands in their place." " You can't console me that way." " No. Well, you'd better talk him round. He's very smitten you'll only have to cry." " I don't see how I can speak to him again we've quarrelled. Tell me what I can do! I don't care how much humble pie I eat as long as he doesn't know don't you ever remind me I said that, or I'll hate you!" " I'd go to Europe if I were you; I can mention to him what boat you're crossing by. Go by a Cunarder, a slow one you'll have time to twist him round your finger before she lands." " I couldn't forgive him right away it'd look like jumping at him." " You can spare two days to be chilly in two days last a long while at sea; they'll seem as long as the winter to him. That'll leave you five or six days to make him do what you want. You'll have trained him up in the way he should go long before you reach Liverpool." " It's a heavenly notion," admitted Betty cheerfully ; "it's sweet of you I hadn't thought of that! But I'm not keen on going to Europe with Howard; I 42 THE HOUSE OF LYNCH know what it means I'll never see him there; he'll leave me in the hotel, looking out of the window. I wish you were going." " Me? We don't go till the Fall." " It's much better now than in the Fall. It's per- fectly ridiculous going over in the Fall. London's empty in the Fall so's Paris. They're a dream in the spring. Come with me! I'll give you a dandy time. Come for a month and buy frocks. You shall come back as soon as I'm engaged." " I should have to put off all my parties. And I'd be so scared about the baby." " What's the matter with her ? " " There's nothing the matter with her, but there might be. With me at sea ! I should go crazy." " You can have a marconigram every day about the baby and a cable every day when we're there. Say you will! You've been such a pal I was just broken up when you came in. Do be sweet and see me through ! " She hung round her, smiling, flushed, coax- ing like a child. " You'd be such a help Howard 'd be no good, he's got no tact. Think what it means: it's just my life's happiness I'm begging of you, Dardy! And we'll go by the Caronia the staterooms have got the cunningest little electric heaters for one's curling- irons." Dardy Waldehast reflected. " Oh, all right then," she THE HOUSE OF LYNCH 43 said, " I'll go ! Better let your father think you're going away to get over it, hadn't you leave him easy?" And when Lynch joined them, the girl said, " I've been telling Dardy she's got to take me to Europe. We want to go by the Caronia the Cunard's so safe." " Well now, that's first-rate, Mrs. Waldehast ! " said the financier, relieved ; " that's just what she wants to buck her up. I'll 'phone for a couple of suites for the next trip. I'm real glad you're both going. Would you like to take Howard along? he'll do to look after the baggage." " Our maids can look after the baggage," said Betty. " A couple of suites and a stateroom for the maids will be enough ; we don't want Howard. Where shall we stay, Dardy? When you cable for rooms, poppa, you might explain that ' Flowers ' means flow- ers in the bedrooms ; I'll never forget the last time we arrived there wasn't a bouquet in a bedroom, it was frightful!" " I'll fix it," assented Lynch, thankful for her brighter tone. He had just been drafting a prospectus that would gull a multitude, but the young women found him gullible. IV AFTER Mrs. Waldehast had told him carelessly that she was to sail with Betty Lynch on the Caronia, Keith hurried to State Street and booked his passage by the boat, rejoicing at his " discovery " ; and at the Metropolitan, later in the evening, Dardy Waldehast threw to Betty, in the opposite box, two little emphatic nods, which said, " I've done it ! " His elation was succeeded by the fear that the girl might not go after all. There were ten days' suspense. The prospect of seeing her constantly during the pas- sage seemed to him too extraordinary to be fulfilled. Something must prevent this maritime heaven! When he drove to the pier at last he was more despondent than excited. A bad night hinted that a caprice had balked him at the final moment, that he was about to put the Atlantic between them. The length of deck was chaos, apparently heaped with the luggage of the world. All the women were speaking at once, and every woman was saying " stew- ard " or " grip." Below, in the great dining-saloon, 44 THE HOUSE OF LYNCH 45 a variety artist queened it at one of the small tables, taking leave of some admirers; champagne popped to her triumphs in London; the table was gorgeous with roses and ribbons, the valedictory expressions of regard. He lost himself in a maze of corridors, and captured his stateroom only after it had eluded him three times. There are staterooms which seem never to be twice in the same place. When he returned, order was prevailing. The deck grew clearer, the last adieux were gabbled. Neither Miss Lynch nor Mrs. Waldehast was to be seen. The endless crowd streamed off, instead of on, now momentarily it looked as if everybody had been a visitor and nobody would be left to sail. Still they were unseen! He gazed forlornly round. And the hotel moved away. He saw them, with a heart thump, about an hour later, after the chairs were set out. He knew that Mrs. Waldehast whispered, " Here's Keith," as he ap- proached, for Betty gave a faint start of astonishment. But she did not turn her head. The other woman ex- claimed, " Why, Mr. Keith ! " with smiling surprise, and there was a few moments' awkward conversation. His embarrassment at intruding upon Betty, who was monosyllabic and obviously chagrined to find him there, made him very constrained. He envied the com- posure with which she contrived to mask her amaze- ment at meeting him, after the first instant of dismay. 46 THE HOUSE OF LYNCH For the rest of the day they kept to their suites. The moonlit deck ungraced was pathetic. In the morning they were not at breakfast. It was eleven o'clock before a stir with their chairs and rugs heralded their appearance. Mrs. Waldehast's comment on the weather in passing him was formal evidently she had been asked to keep him at a distance. As to that, there was a smoking-room! But, after all, it wasn't to admire the smoking-room that he had chosen the Caronia I He went to luncheon resolved to find his opportunity before the moon could mock him again. The afternoon was blank until the tea-cups circu- lated. Then the two ladies settled themselves on the boat deck, but were inseparable until a sudden shower sent everyone scurrying into the lounge. " I think this is where I leave you ? " said the confidante. " Well, don't be gone more than a minute or two!" mur- mured Betty. Mrs. Waldehast got up and shivered she went below for a wrap. The girl remained on the divan, absorbed by a magazine. He reached her in three strides. " Aren't you going to let me talk to you ? " " I don't know why you should want to talk to me," she said, at once startled, proud, and re- proachful. " It's all I'm here for I heard you were going." THE HOUSE OF LYNCH 47 " I think it was a great pity you heard. It was very foolish of Dardy to speak about it." "I'm very grateful that she did! . . . You got my letter? " She bent her head silently. " I waited in the whole day for your answer. It was a very long day." "What answer did you expect?" The tone was a rebuke. " I hoped you'd say that you forgave me for hurt- ing you. Will you? If you knew how bad I've been feeling " "I'd rather not hear about it, please!" she said. " I wish to forget." "Me?" After a second's pause she faltered, "Yes; what else can I do now? " " You can say you'll marry me I love you, I love you so much! Betty, I've felt a brute and a cad for saying what I did to you I've seen that look in your eyes ever since. Won't you forgive me?" " You told me we couldn't be happy together. What's the good of asking me to forgive you? " " I told you we couldn't be happy on your money. I'm not asking you to marry me on that. If you care for me, can't you can't you give it up? " 48 THE HOUSE OF LYNCH " Oh ! " She made a movement of impatience. " You ask me to marry you one minute, and insult me the next. I think you're crazy! " " You know I don't mean to insult you; it's much worse for me to have to speak about the money than it is for you to hear. But you've got to un- derstand me. We needn't discuss my reasons any more; I'd much rather not. It amounts to this: if you marry me, you'll live on what I can make for you! It's what I implore you to do. If you'll only " Dardy Waldehast came back with a cape on. " Hasn't it turned cold? " she said to Keith, as casually as if she had just been chatting with him. " Feel my hands! " Betty was sorry that she had commanded such a quick return. But the ice was broken now, and, though the brief conversation was different from the one she had forecast, she felt in better spirits for it. So did Keith. They talked again in the drawing- room after dinner. Somebody sang Tosti. And after Tosti, the deck was dry, but not dry enough for Mrs. Waldehast. He and Betty sauntered alone. She looked at the sky, and paid a compliment to the moon. " It's much better than it was last night," he said appreciatively. THE HOUSE OF LYNCH 49 " I didn't notice it last night; we didn't come up." " No and it gibed ! I had been on the Caronia for aeons without getting a word with you. The moon quoted Browning." " Carnegie must have found a new field for his libraries! What did it say? " " ' Never the time, and the place, and the loved one all together.' Oh, I was wretched last night! The deck was calling for you. . . . Do you know do you know, I'm almost inclined to wish that I hadn't any principles! It would make things so much easier. I never thought I could be in a situa- tion where I shouldn't know the right course from the wrong, but but Is a man a selfish beast to try to make a girl renounce a fortune for him, or would he be only half a lover to let her go when they care for each other? ... If I thought you'd re- gret yielding, I'd say ' good-bye ' and try to forget you, as I meant to do; I would, on my honour!" " Don't you think you may be unjust? " she asked haltingly. " I told my father what you said; he said you didn't understand. He said that every business has its enemies. Even if it is a small business, there is always somebody smaller who complains of it and says that it's wicked and tyrannical. My father has always been very good to me. If you knew how kind he has been to me, you wouldn't think he was 50 THE HOUSE OF LYNCH a bad man. When you say what you do, I Well, I don't like to hear you speak ill of him!" " I don't want to speak ill of him, Betty. It's be- cause I don't want to hurt you that I can't justify myself to you. My tongue's tied; I can only say that I condemn and it sounds like a prig. But I'm not the only person who condemns; you know that, dear, as well as I do." " All the world may make mistakes," she pleaded. " You admitted just now that you weren't sure if you were right." " I'm not sure if I'm right in asking you to give the wealth up, but I'm quite sure I'm right in re- fusing to share it. I'll never consent to do that. . . . The truth is, I haven't the courage of my own con- victions. I'd rejoice to see you give it up I'd think you a nobler woman. It makes me sick when I re- member that your pleasures are paid for with other people's ruin but I take fright at the responsibility of asking you to give it up for me. I ask you and wonder if it's monstrous of me directly afterwards. My view is right, I know it's right; but then I shouldn't have expressed it toyou if I didn't want you to marry me and perhaps that makes me wrong! " They strolled the length of their promenade be- fore she spoke. " I think there'd be nothing gained if we were to THE HOUSE OF LYNCH 51 talk for ever! " she said harshly. " It's just as im- possible for you to understand my father's business as it would be for my father to understand your art. We won't talk about it any more, please." " You're angry with me again? " She shrugged a shoulder: " Oh, you have a right to your opinion, I suppose; I'm not angry with you." " That's as cruel a thing as you could say." " How can I help hating myself? " she exclaimed, with a break in her voice. " How do you suppose I must feel? Do you suppose these things are pleasant to me to hear? Do you suppose I forget that I needn't have heard them if I hadn't said what I did to you? You were going away you'd never have known, 7'd have had nothing to be ashamed of! " " Are you sure of that? " " What do you mean? " " Do you remember something you said to me that night? You said, ' I know about the people ruined, and the broken homes, and it doesn't make me feel good when I think of it.' Are you sure you'll always be able to put the thought aside? Are you sure the time can't come when the millions won't be enough when the cries of the people will keep you awake? I don't want to invent a conscience for you, but are you positive that you'll never be ashamed? " She paused by the taffrail, with averted face. The 52 THE HOUSE OF LYNCH subtlety of her sex had gone, and left her helpless. She was no strategist, trying to bend his will now; she was a girl in love with swimming eyes, and a lump in her throat, and a nose turning pink. " I know just how you think about me," she gulped. " You think I'm fonder of my fortune than of you! It's not true." " Betty! " " I'm not, I'm not! And I know you're right yes, I do know it, right down deep but I don't want to hear about it. He's my father, you see. Take me! I don't want the dollars, I swear I don't I only want to be happy! " " O my sweet! " he stammered. " If there were nobody here! Betty, I'm holding you, I'm thanking God for you, I'm kissing your feet, and your tears, and your lips my heart, my love! " " I know I'm not as brave as I ought to be," she quavered, "but I will try! I want to be just what you'd like. You won't ever be sorry for marrying me, will you I mean if I make a muss of things? It won't be that I'm not happy and proud to be your wife, only that I don't know how to set to work. I'll be content in ever so poky a cottage, and and 1 can't cook the dinner, I don't know how, but I'll learn all about art, so that you shan't feel you've married a fool. And you shan't ever paint portraits! " THE HOUSE OF LYNCH 53 Their hands clung together on the rail. " I'd paint portraits all my life for you," said the man reverently, " I'd throw art overboard for you! I thought I loved you before, but I didn't know what love was -I didn't know what a woman could be! ... And you won't have to cook the dinner, my queen, or live in a cottage; it won't be so bad as all that. I make " " Sh! " she whispered. " Never mind what you make I am so tired of you and me talking dollars." The first officer hurried by them, looking the other way. " I've made a perfect fright of myself," she smiled, dabbing her fingers at her eyes, " and I haven't got a handkerchief." She borrowed Keith's: "You're beginning to provide for me already! " " Betty, when will you marry me? Will you marry me as soon as we land? " "Oh!" she laughed, in the glory of surrender. " Are you so afraid I'll change my mind? " " No. But I want to prove to you how much I mean it. ... Betty!" " Yes, sir? " " You've never called me ' Dick.' ' " I think ' Richard ' suits you much better; you aren't ' Dick ' a bit. Do they call you ' Dick ' ? " " No very few people do." 54 THE HOUSE OF LYNCH "Then 7 shall Dick!" "Betty!" " You'll know that name soon! " " Where shall we live? " " Dear," she pouted, " let's live in a moonbeam to-night. Don't let's be practical yet I don't want to be practical any more. It doesn't matter where we live if I make you happy." At the piano somebody sang again. The lyric did not reach her, but the melody harmonised with the music of her mood. Presently the ship's bells jarred, startling them to the remembrance of time. " We must go down to Dardy," she murmured. "Will you say 'good-night' to me first?" Now, where they leant there was no one in view she saw nothing but him, and the sea, and the stars. He drew nearer still. Her eyes closed. Oh, it was worth it, worth it a thousandfold! She was sure she would think so as long as she lived. DARDY WALDEHAST was less optimistic. She divined the engagement directly they returned to the draw- ing-room, but she attributed capitulation to the wrong side. It was not till she was in Betty's par- lour with her, and the steward had left them to their bovril and toast, that she was staggered by the facts. She stared, with her spoon half-way to her mouth. " And what do you imagine your father's going to say? " she demanded. " You don't imagine for a moment he'll allow it, do you ? " " I mean to write to him at once; I'll mail the letter from Queenstown. It's my own life if I'm satisfied, nobody else has any reason to complain. . . . Oh, put it down and be nice, Dardy I feel so happy and so good, and I don't want to think about anything horrid! " They sat on the sofa, with their arms round each other. " I'd never have believed it of you! . . . When is it supposed to be? Is he coming back to New York with us? " 55 56 THE HOUSE OF LYNCH " What for? I won't go back to New York. We'll live in London we shall be married in London." " Will your father come over? " Betty's eyes grew solemn. " I don't know," she said pensively, " I've been wondering. I've got to tell him, you see, that he mustn't settle anything on me that I've promised not to take it. He can't be expected to be keen on meeting Dick after that! . . . And even if he did care to come, it'd be rather rather painful for us all, wouldn't it? I don't want " she plucked at her friend's lace-^-" I don't want to have a father there that Dick feels such things about. How can I? It'll be Dick's wedding too! I I think the church should be quite sweet for us both when he marries me." The other woman kissed her, and they sat silent. "My father's in the Trust as well," she said at last hesitatingly. " Yes." " 7've never worried." " You did one day, Dardy. Do you remember? " " We were kids then and thought we were hero- ines. What's the good of making our lives a misery? We can't alter it. Besides, I don't believe it's so bad as they say; it's all nonsense. Nobody has a word to say against Hal and Hal never .fussed about my dollars. . . . It's an awful pity there's not one THE HOUSE OF LYNCH 57 man in a million who would be such a fool. I don't know why it should happen to you to meet him! ... Well, if your father doesn't come over for it, who'll be there? " "Why, you!" " I can't do it, dear you mustn't let me in for that! It isn't what I was brought for. He'd be mad with me! And anyhow, I can't stay more than the month you don't mean to have it within a month? " "I I don't know," said Betty; "yes, I expect we will. I won't want to buy a trousseau. ... I shall write my father all you say; he can't say it's your fault." " I'd never have believed it of you! " said the other again. " One thing Well ! " "What's that?" " Well, of course, it needn't last you can always have it your own way afterwards. But " The girl shook her head, startled. " I wouldn't do that!" she breathed. "That's over I'm being real with him." Her gaze remained wide and introspec- tive. " I wish you hadn't said that! " " I'm sorry." " You don't know how I wish we hadn't schemed that day! I hate myself for having shammed to him. It'd be lovely if I hadn't meant him to come, 58 THE HOUSE OF LYNCH and he had just surprised me here as he thinks he has. I'd like it all to have been quite true." Mrs. Waldehast grimaced. " You'll make me en- vious in a minute / shall never have those cranky and beautiful emotions any more! . . . You'd better drink that now, and turn in and dream of him. Pull the bedclothes up high, or your wings'll take cold! I'm not going to talk sense to you again to-night." But she talked to Keith on the morrow. " You know, Mr. Keith," she said, " I feel a great responsibility. Betty's father has trusted her to me, and I can't stand by and see her spoil her life. You must know as well as I do that this won't work we don't live in a romance." The throbbing of the steamer was very loud in his ears. " You think I am behaving badly to her? " he asked, when he found his voice. " I think you are behaving badly to yourself. Mr. Lynch is devoted to her; he would consent to any- thing to make her happy. If you refuse to let him help you, you are wilfully turning your back on a fortune/' " She is prepared to live on less than I can offer her," he pleaded. "Prepared! Have you any notion of what she is used to? She has had her own account since she was eighteen, and the bank has been told to honour THE HOUSE OF LYNCH 59 her cheques to any extent. My husband is a rich man, but Betty has spent as much in a year on nothing particular as I have spent on my house; everything solid has been paid for by her father." " For Heaven's sake, don't imagine that I under- value what she's doing," he exclaimed. " It's the grandest thing that a girl ever did for a man. I know that nothing, nothing on my side can be enough to I'll worship her for it. She's brave indeed! " " She's in love! I don't quarrel with her for that I'm not much older than she is; but I'm a mar- ried woman, and on this point I'm older than the two of you. While a girl's in love, everything the man says is a law of the Medes and Persians to her, she sees with his eyes; but afterwards, if she has any more backbone than porridge-and-cream, she begins to sit up and survey for herself again. I can't argue about Mr. Lynch's commercial reputation, / don't pretend to understand finance" Keith did not miss the reflection " but I do understand Betty, and I tell you that if you think her conver- sion to your view is anything but the fizz of the moment, you are making a big mistake. You will spare yourself and her a great deal of unnecessary pain by listening to reason at the start." " If you mean * by taking help from- her father/ " he stammered, " I can't do it at the start, or at any 60 THE HOUSE OF LYNCH other time. Betty thoroughly understands that. I'm sorry if I sound hard." He sounded, on the contrary, very weak. It is one thing to have intense convictions, and another to uphold them to strangers. Keith would never have swayed mobs, he was too sensitive to a jeer. He felt like a boy beside her, nervous, shamefaced. "Well!" her gesture was resigned, "you are en- titled to your principles, of course; but I tell you frankly I think that, having the objection that you have, you did very wrong in the first instance to propose to her." In the first instance, however, she had proposed to him. " Do you mean that I ought to give her up? " he said unsteadily. " I'm so fond of her, Mrs. Walde- hast you're a woman, you ought to know how much I mean it! But if she wished she hadn't mar- ried me it'd be terrible; I'd rather it came to nothing than make her wretched for life. Do you mean that I ought to give her up? " Dardy Waldehast flinched. A vision of Betty as- sailed her Betty at white heat, Betty demanding wrathfully " how she dared? " After all, was the re- sponsibility so great as she asserted? There would be plenty of time for Lynch to take decisive meas- ures if he chose! THE HOUSE OF LYNCH 61 " I don't mean anything of the sort," she said; " I mean that you should agree to her father making a settlement. All she'll bring you, if y