“No, of course not. But wouldn’t it be lovely?” added Rosie. “Why couldn’t you?” asked Ilam. “You are your own mistresses, aren’t you? What is there to prevent you?” “Well, you see,” said Pauline judicially, “we have our living to get, and then there’s our flat, and----” “I don’t know how much you earn,” Ilam cried. “But I’ll cheerfully undertake to give you treble, whatever it is.” “That would be five hundred and forty-six pounds a year, then,” said Rosie, who was specially good at arithmetic. “Let us say six hundred,” Ilam amended the figure with a tremendously casual air. The girls felt that, after all, perhaps he resembled a millionaire more than they had at first thought. “Come, now,” Ilam urged. “Say yes. It’s an idea that came to me all of a sudden, while I was talking to you. But it’s an idea that gets better and better the more I think about it.” “But we couldn’t give up our situations,” objected Pauline. “Why not?” Ilam asked. “I don’t know,” Pauline stammered. “It seems so queer. It’s so sudden. What would our duties be here?” “Your duties would be to act as mistresses of this house, and to look after my poor mother. Of course, there’d be a nurse as well. I don’t know how many servants there are--five or six.” “And we should have to manage everything?” said Pauline. “Everything domestic. Come, you agree?” “But suppose,” interpolated Rosie--“suppose we--you--we didn’t suit you?” What she meant was “Suppose you didn’t suit us?” “Come a month on trial,” said Ilam. “At the end of that time, if you want to leave, I’ll guarantee you a situation quite as good as you’re leaving. I can’t say fairer than that, can I?” There was a pause; the twins looked at each other. “Just think how I’m fixed!” pleaded Ilam. “What do you say, Rosie?” Pauline asked primly of her sister. “Well,” answered Rosie, “as cousin is in such a dilemma, and poor Mrs. Ilam so--so ill, perhaps----” “Good!” exclaimed Ilam; “you agree. Good! I’m very much obliged to you. You’re two really nice girls, and I can assure you you’ll have a free hand here.” “You decide for us,” said Pauline, smiling and reddening under Ilam’s appreciation. “We’ll begin at once, eh?” said Ilam. “Tonight.” “Oh, that’s quite out of the question,” objected Rosie. “We shall be obliged to give a month’s notice at Shooter’s.” “Nonsense!” said Ilam. “I’ll send ‘em a cheque for a month’s salary instead; then they can’t grumble.” “But to-morrow? How will they manage without us?” persisted Rosie. Ilam laughed--and it was not often that Ilam laughed. Either the humour of the thing must have appealed to him very strongly, or it was a symptom that his spirits had mightily improved. “They’ll manage without you,” he said. “It’s true they can get substitutes from the Typewriting Exchange,” said Pauline.