“It is because I love her that I am so desirous of seeing her happy and settled,--not to get rid of her.” “Yes, I suppose so; and I’m a brute,” said the husband. “Well, if Phil has been waiting until he should be certain about his own condition financially, he will not need to wait much longer. I don’t know whether it’s through brains, or tact, or what’s called lover’s luck, but he’s been doing so well among railroad-people that in common decency I must either raise his salary largely or give him an interest in the business.” “Well, really, you speak as if the business depended upon him.” “For a month or two he’s been taking all the orders; I’ve been simply a sort of clerk, to distribute them among mills, or find out where iron could be had for those who wanted it in haste. He’s after an order now--from the Lake and Gulfside Road--that I let him attempt at first merely to keep him from growing conceited. It seemed too great and difficult a job to place any hope on; but I am beginning to half believe he’ll succeed. If he does, I’ll simply be compelled to give him an interest in the business: if I don’t, some of my competitors will coax him away from me.” “What! after all you have done for him?” “Tut! tut! the favor is entirely on the other side. Had some outsider brought me the orders which that boy has taken, I would have had to pay twenty times as much in commissions as Phil’s salary has amounted to. What do you think of ‘Edgar Tramlay & Co.’ for a business sign, or even ‘Tramlay & Hayn’?” “I suppose it will have to be,” said the lady, without any indication of gratification, “and, if it must be, the sooner the better, for it can’t help making Lucia’s position more certain. If it doesn’t do so at once, I shall believe it my duty to speak to the young man.” “Don’t! don’t, I implore!” exclaimed the merchant. “He will think----” “What he may think is of no consequence,” said Mrs. Tramlay. “It is time that he should know what city etiquette demands.” “But it isn’t necessary, is it, that he should know how matter-of-fact and cold-hearted we city people can be about matters which country-people think should be approached with the utmost heart and delicacy? Don’t let him know what a mercenary, self-serving lot of wretches we are, until he is so fixed that he can’t run away.” “Edgar, the subject is not one to be joked about, I assure you.” “And I assure you, my dear, that I’m not more than half joking,--not a bit more.” “I shall not say more than thousands of the most loving and discreet mothers have been obliged to say in similar circumstances,” said Mrs. Tramlay. “If you cannot trust me to discharge this duty delicately, perhaps you will have the kindness to undertake it yourself.” “The very thing!” said Tramlay. “If he must have unpleasant recollections of one of us, I would rather it wouldn’t be his mother-in-law. The weight of precedent is against you, don’t you know?--though not through any fault of yours.”