"Simply because I have got tired of living the life of a barbarian--surrounded by barbarians. It was well enough to spend four years of early manhood in camps and battles, three others in building a big railroad, and three more in the excitement of mining, away from the _convenances_ and graces of life that only come with the presence of refined women; but now I am tired of it, more so than ever since I have seen that young lady down-stairs." "Ah! still going back to Miss Travenion?" laughs the lawyer. "You know her name then?" cries the captain, suddenly. "Yes," says the other. "I happened to be impatient for your coming. The evening was sultry. I walked out of the room, looked down the stairs and saw your act of gallantry." "Ah, since you know her name, you must know her!" "Quite well; I am her trustee." "Her trustee!" cries Harry Lawrence impulsively. "Her guardian? You will introduce me to her? This is luck," and before the old gentleman can interrupt him, the Westerner has seized his hand and given it a squeeze which he remembers for some five minutes. "I said her trustee; not her guardian," answers the lawyer cautiously. "If, as your manner rather indicates, you have designs upon the young lady's heart, you had better get a reply from her father." "Her father is living then?" "Certainly. Last January you could have seen him any afternoon in the windows of the Unity Club looking at the ladies promenading on the Avenue, just as he used to do when he lived here, and was a man about town, and club _habitue_ and heavy swell. Ralph Travenion has gone West again, however, but I have not heard of his death." "Then for what reason does his daughter need a trustee?" "Well, if you will listen to me and smoke your cigar in silence," says Southmead, for they have arrived at that stage of the meal. "Erma Lucille Travenion----" "Erma--Lucille--Travenion!" mutters the young man, turning the words over very tenderly as if they were sweet morsels on his tongue. "Erma--Lucille--Travenion,--what a beautiful name." "Hang it, don't interrupt me and don't look romantic," laughs the lawyer. But here a soft-treading waiter knocks upon the door and says: "Mr. Ferdinand Rives Chauncey would like to see you half a minute, Mr. Southmead." And with the words, the young gentleman announced, a dapper boy of about nineteen, faultlessly clad in the evening dress of that period, enters hastily and says: "My dear Mr. Southmead, Mrs. Livingston has commissioned me to ask you if you won't come down and join her for a few moments. Oh, I beg pardon--" He pauses and gives a look expectant of introduction towards Harry Lawrence. The lawyer, following his glance, presents the two young men, and after acknowledging it, Chauncey proceeds glibly, "Awful sorry to have interrupted you." "Won't you sit down and have a glass of wine and a cigar?" says Southmead hospitably.