always have her daughters with her, especially as they were already of an age to have many tastes in common with her, and the Misses Pound said that it was truly painful to see people who had once been very wealthy reduced in circumstances, like the Ayrs, for example, and that both families were carefully polite when they met. Now Mr. Margent was thought to be on the point of declaring himself, and when he appeared one afternoon his intentions were obvious. He was, if possible, more scrupulously dressed than ever. His clothes, trimly cut in the latest style, were new and spotless. His plump, not to say puffy, face, of an overfed white, was as smooth-shaven as ever. His plentiful watch-chain and his elegant shoes and his expensive stockings were, if possible, more plentiful and elegant and expensive than ever. When Miss Josephine appeared in a fresh costume, his small gray eyes revolved about her with an appearance of sluggish satisfaction which for him was almost animation. "Business," said he--"business's been splendid this year. Tip-top. C. B. & Q. brought us in ten thousand at one clip the other day. Fact;" and Mr. Margent paused for a fresh supply of ideas. "How nice that is!" said Miss Josephine, gently, with a shade of tender appreciation in her voice. "But it costs a dreadful deal to live. We all live at hotels, you know--all the boys. And then a fellow has to have his cab: all the boys have cabs. And then we've got to have clothes. But I'm economizing on that. I cut myself down to twenty suits last year. I don't see any use of a fellow's having more than twenty suits;" and Mr. Margent paused again, intellectually out of breath. "I think you're a very extravagant creature," said the charming Miss Josephine, playfully shaking her finger at him. "If you had a wife to take care of you, you wouldn't be allowed to spend so much money." "Well, do you know, I've been thinking of getting married. I was talking with the boys about it the other day. I said I believed a man could support a wife on seven thousand a year--keeping a fellow's cab, and staying at the hotel, you know, and all that sort of thing"--he hastened to add, with a little anxiety in his voice. "The boys bet I couldn't, and I bet I could, and I believe it was then that I really made up my mind to get married. Don't you believe it could be done on that?" Mr. Margent found himself the subject of a suffusion of ideas, and had the appearance of being surprised at his own gifts. Miss Josephine was of the opinion, in a low voice, and with an expression of intense interest in the lace in her sleeve, that it could be done for that.