"Mr. Drayton, a person for whose family I have a high regard, comes to-morrow to consult with me on important business. We must ask him to dinner." "Very well," answered Mrs. Dorriman, not fully aware of the importance he attached to this arrival. "He is a man of enormous wealth, enormous wealth, and comes to consult me about some investments." He rolled out these words with immense emphasis, and looked round at the three faces to see what impression his announcement had made. "Is he good-looking?" asked Grace, with some interest in her manner. "Is he amusing?" "Is he a friend of yours, John?" Mrs. Dorriman asked gently. "I never heard his name before." Margaret was mute. "How can I tell what you consider good-looking," he answered, roughly. "He is a fine strong well-built fellow, and has seen a great deal of the world, and he is a successful man, which is more than being good-looking or amusing, let me tell you." "If he has seen the world he will be at any rate interesting," said Mrs. Dorriman, rising; but when they had reached the door he called her back, and said in a tone of mystery: "You spoke of society and giving the girls a chance. I don't wish Margaret away, but if George Drayton takes a fancy to Grace she will have to take him." Mrs. Dorriman shivered: this speech recalled her own youth, when she had to "take" the husband he had chosen for her. Instinct often gives a woman the right weapon to use, and she said now hurriedly: "If you let her know this, if you tell her this, she will set herself against him." He looked at her with that sort of surprise which always came to him when she showed anything of the wisdom of the serpent he considered her so completely without. "I think you are right," he said, slowly; "but I mean this marriage to be, and you understand if you see a way of helping it I expect you to help it on." "If I like the man--if I approve," she said, in a low voice, but with a firmness unusual to her. "And if she likes him." Mr. Sandford laughed his usual sarcastic laugh. "_If! if! if!_" he exclaimed. He was going to say something, but there was a look in her face that warned him he had better not. He turned sharply round and went off to his own room. "Grace, my darling!" whispered Margaret to her sister as they stood in the window that night with the grimy world before them hushed into silence, and the stars shining down upon them, "perhaps this will be the Prince." "It does not sound like it, Margaret," she answered, scornfully. "A manufacturer, and a man no longer young." "We cannot tell," said Margaret. "But it may be, oh, I hope, I hope it may be your prince, and that he may be charming and everything your prince ought to be."