"I think you're awfully good to me, Aunt Marianna," Norma said, thoughtfully. "I told Wolf about it, and he thinks so, too. But honestly----" Even with her secret knowledge of her own parentage, Norma was surprised at the fluttered anxiety of the old lady, and Leslie was frankly puzzled. "No, Norma--no, Norma," Mrs. Melrose said, nervously and imploringly. "I don't want you to discuss that at all--it's _settled_. The check is to be deposited every month, or quarter, or whatever it was----" "Don't be a fool, Norma, you'll need it, one way or another," Leslie assured her. But in her own heart Leslie wondered at her grandmother's generosity. "Everybody needs more money. I'll bet you the King of England----" "Oh, kings!" Norma laughed. "They're the worst of all. I don't know about this one, but they're always appealing for special funds--all of them. And that's one thing that makes Wolf so mad--the fact that all they have to do, for ridiculous extravagances, is clap on a tax." But Leslie and her grandmother were not interested in the young engineer's economic theories. The old lady followed Norma's spirited summary merely with an uneasy: "You mustn't let your husband get any socialistic ideas, Norma; there's too much of that now!" and Leslie, after a close study of Norma's glowing face, remarked suddenly: "Norma, I'll bet you a _dollar_ you're rouged!" Before she left, the visitor managed a casual inquiry about Aunt Alice. Aunt Alice was fine, Leslie answered carelessly, adding immediately that no, Aunt Alice really wasn't extremely well. Doctor Garrett didn't want her to go away this summer, thought that move was an unnecessary waste of energy, since Aunt Alice's house was so cool, and she felt the heat so little. And Chris said that Alice had always really wanted to stay in town, in her own comfortable suite. She liked her second nurse immensely, and Miss Slater was really running the house now, the third nurse coming only at night. "But Aunt Alice never had a nurse at night," Norma was going to say. But she caught the stricken and apprehensive look on the old lady's face, and substituted generously: "Well, I remember Aunt Alice told me she had one of these wretched times several years ago." "Yes, indeed she did--frightened us almost to death," Mrs. Melrose agreed, thankfully. "And how is--how is Chris?" Norma felt proud of the natural tone in which she could ask the question. "Chris is fine," Leslie answered. She rarely varied the phrase in this relation. "He's hunting in Canada. He had a wire from some man there, and he went off about a week ago. They're going after moose, I believe; Chris didn't expect to get back for a month. Aunt Alice was delighted, because she hates to keep him in town all summer, but Acton told me that he thought Chris was sick--that he and Judge Lee just made him go."