“Because, dear boy, the case is just a trifle complicated, don’t you know. I can always get the parental consent; that’s the money, you know. As a general thing the girls like me, and I won’t say the money has all to do with that: no, I flatter myself, personal attractions, a fair amount of brains, and a certain artistic reputation come in there; but money tells with the older people. Now Sartwell and I understand each other. Not to put too fine a point upon it, you know, he says practically: ‘Barney, you’re an ass, but you’re rich, and I don’t suppose you’re a bigger fool than the average young man of the present day, so I give you a fair field; go in, my boy, and win.’ I say to Sartwell: ‘You’re a grumpy old curmudgeon, with no more artistic perception than the Shot Tower; but your daughter is an angel, and I’ve got money enough for the two of us.’ You see, I never did care for money except to get what I want. So there we stand. Sart-well was coming down here with me; but, after I started, he telegraphed to my studio that there was so much to do in the shops, with all the men newly back, that he would like me to postpone my visit for a week. Well, I had to get the horses and trap down here; so I drove, and I left London a day earlier than I expected to. Hence the present complication. I called at the school, asked to see Miss Sartwell, saying I was a friend of her father’s; but the lady in charge looked on me with suspicion,--she did indeed, my boy, difficult to believe as the statement is. The lady said she could not allow Miss Sartwell to see any person unless that person was accompanied by her father. She would take no message to the girl--and there I was. I wrote to Miss Sartwell from my hotel here, but the letter was opened by the dragon, who returned it to me, asking me not to attempt to communicate with any of the young ladies under her charge. So here is this stylish tandem, and there is that lovely girl, while I am wasting in the desert air, longing to take her out for a drive. That’s the situation in a nut shell, don’t you know, and I want you to help me by taking a message to Miss Edna.” “I don’t see how I can do it. If you, with her father’s permission, could not get a word with her, how can I hope to?”