“Certainly. You see,” she beamed, “how easy it is for reasonable people to arrange things when they understand what they are trying to get at! And now I must go; you are starved. I will come again this afternoon; I will bring you the money and the note. You see we are quite businesslike, Mr. Dean. Well, I have to be; I manage my own affairs. I'll just run in a moment to see 'Thusia before I go. And--I almost forgot it--congratulations!” “Congratulations?” “Alice! She told me! I am so glad!” David did not know, on the spur of the moment, what to say. Before he could formulate words Lucille, jingling her bracelets and rustling her silks, had swept voluminously from the room. XV. LANNY ON those days when 'Thusia was able to be downstairs Alice set a small dinner table in the sitting room so that she might enjoy the company of her husband and children. When David entered the sitting room Lucille had departed, and Roger was there, waiting for his belated dinner. Luckily his labors were not of sufficient importance to require prompt hours--his dinner hour sometimes lasted the best half of the afternoon. As David entered the room Alice ran to him, and threw her arms around him; he could do no less than embrace her, for anything else would have been like a slap in the face. He kissed her, but his face was grave. “Father! Mother told you?” Alice said, still holding him. “Aren't you surprised! Why,” she pouted, “you don't look a bit happy! But I know why--you don't know Lanny. They don't know him, do they, pop?” Her brother, who had already taken his place at the small table, fidgeted. He was hungry. “He's all right!” he said. “Lanny's fine.” Somehow the young Roger's approval did not carry far with David. “I think,” he said, “we are all hungry. We will have our food, and discuss Alice's affairs later. I know I am too hungry to want to talk.” “And you aren't even going to congratulate me!” pouted Alice playfully. The dominie cut short further talk by saying grace, following it by the operation of serving food from the dishes that were grouped around his plate, and then: “How is your grandfather, Roger?” “Fine as a fiddle, father. And, I say! we are going to play Derlingport this Saturday. We've arranged a series of three games, unless one or the other of us wins the first two. We play the first here, and the second in Derlingport. Honestly, I am glad to play a nine I'm a bit afraid of; this licking the spots off the grangers is getting monotonous. Derlingport has a pitcher that knows his business--Watts. But I'll chance Lanny against him any day.” “I should think so!” said Alice. “Oh, you!” said Roger. “Because he has curly hair? A lot you know about pitchers.” “Well, I'm going to learn,” said Alice. David broke the thread of the conversation. “'Thusia,” he said, “I have arranged to clear up the bills we owe.” “David!” his wife exclaimed, her pale cheeks coloring with pleasure. “Did the trustees grant the advance on your salary?”