“I count on you to control in future Mrs. Willoughby’s business. Make yourself her friend and confidant. My wife is a tiger-cat of jealousy. Some fools or fiends have been working upon her spoiled babyhood. I’ve vainly told her that the woman whom she hates was past her youth and old enough to be her mother; but she will listen to no reason. “Now, old fellow, you can easily gain Mrs. Willoughby’s good will. Her account is the best on the Street, and, in this way, if you join us, we can divide the profits, and I am then safe from a fruitless quarrel. Of course, I’ve got to drop the Willoughby for good.” There was a shrill cry of rage and defiance. Vreeland’s heart leaped up. “Let me read the rest of that _alone_,” cried Elaine, with blazing eyes. After a moment’s pause, she handed it back, when she had noted Hathorn’s signature. “He asks you to cable him your decision!” breathlessly said the Queen of the Street. “I have simply telegraphed: ‘_Impossible! I decline!_’” answered Vreeland, and then, in the silence the shade of Judas Iscariot laughed far down in hell. Their hands met in a silent pledge of a friendship which shone in Elaine Willoughby’s misty eyes. “_How can I thank you?_” she began; but gravely Harold Vreeland addressed her to her growing astonishment. “Wait!” he said, with a seeming reluctance. “I never would have shown you that letter but to save your own noble soul from the humiliation of stooping to a conference with a man who would so meanly trade upon your past bounty and try to trap you, through me. Your confidence has brought this out. But, you must hear all. I claim no credit for declining to be the man to hoodwink you. ‘The pleasant days of Aranjuez’ are waning fast. I am soon going to leave New York and go back to the great West.” Vreeland noted the quick, convulsive start, and his heart rejoiced as she grasped his hands, whispering: “Never! My one faithful knight shall stay here _near me_ to battle in my defense, ‘even if I am old enough to be Alida Hathorn’s mother.’ Tell me all. It is my right now to know all your plans.” The handsome adventurer raised his grave face to her own. “I will, if you will promise me to ignore these two people—the hollow-hearted man who would use me to entrap you, and that saucy girl, a spoiled child from her cradle. Hathorn carries his own future punishment around with him in that crisp bundle of dimity.” The unspoken pledge of her eyes told him that his _coup_ had succeeded. “By Jove!” he mused, “she is only a woman, like the rest. The taunt as to her age has cut her deeper than this fellow’s rank ingratitude.” He gazed upon her Indian summer beauty, and his eyes strayed away to the pillared glories of the matchless country mansion. “She’s worth the risk—with Lakemere,” he reflected. “I’ll try it!” He yielded and spoke, and she listened with tender eyes.