She had no suspicion that what she had said about the pale lady and her baby and the pale lady's husband, had stirred any curiosity in the man's mind. But this topic held quite as important a place in his thoughts at the time as the mystery of the ten thousand dollars. He wanted to know what manner of people these Lairds were. Because of the baby, his wife had become deeply interested in them. Baby Laird reminded her so much, she said, of her own "Baby Joe" of a quarter of a century before. And, then, that this stranger baby should bear her own child's middle name--that piqued his wife's curiosity; although, to tell the truth, Carolyn May's friend had never given it his attention before. In addition, he had given Barzilla Ball an invitation for the baby's father to come to see him, and the man had not appeared. There was something in that which the capitalist could not understand. Usually people did not have to be coaxed when he offered financial favours. They walked along the shore as the red sun slipped down into a feather bed of cloud resting on the sea and on Montauk. "'Red in the morning, Sailors take warning; Red at night, Sailors delight,'" chanted Carolyn, repeating what Barzilla had taught her. She clung to her friend's forefinger and skipped joyfully along the sand. He looked down at her with a grim smile playing about his lips. He thought that this child was actually the first whom he had ever had time to get acquainted with. In the case of his own son he had been too busy--too eager at money-getting--to know much about him. His wife talked now, in her nervous, irresponsible way, of "her baby." It was a fact. The son of their house had been her baby; never his; for he had been in no mood to give the lad a father's care. When he was grown (and a manly fellow he was, no thanks to his father) the latter had found the young man as stubborn a character as he was himself. If he was the "Old Griffin," this boy just out of college was "Young Grif." He was not to be ordered about as the man was in the habit of ordering his employ s. The trouble had begun there and then. An order to the son was like a lash across the withers of an unbroken and high-spirited colt. The old man realized the trouble, but believed it could be mended. Now he knew he had taken his son into his own hands too late. His character was already moulded. Yet the Griffin would not blame the mother. It was his own fault that the boy was not an automaton--as were his employ s, even his managers. The Griffin had become used to unquestioned obedience, and to silence when he spoke. His son did not fit into that system. And so, after all, it was more because his son was not what he expected him to be than anything else, that bred discord between them. The girl was but an excuse.