Duncan spent an unsatisfactory hour knocking the balls around, then took refuge in the library. Selecting a novel he made himself comfortable before the open fire, and commenced reading. But his attention wandered from the printed page; before him constantly was Marjorie Langdon’s face. Surely he had not found his ideal but to lose her? He caught a glimpse of himself in the mirror over the fireplace, and his mouth set grimly. What chance had his plain features and taciturn manner against Barnard’s handsome face and gay debonair personality? He had inherited his looks and his temperament from some dour Scotch ancestor. It would take a miracle to make him a parlor knight. His book fell with a thud to the floor, and as he stooped to pick it up, the door opened and Marjorie walked in. “Can I see your father?” she asked. “I am sorry, he is not in,” Duncan sprang up and pushed forward a chair. “Won’t I serve the purpose?” “Oh, yes.” She stepped forward and removed a small roll of bank notes from her muff. “Janet cashed one hundred and fifty dollars for your father, and asked me to give it to him. Will you see that the money reaches him?” placing the bank notes on the library table. “I’m afraid I can’t sit down, Mr. Fordyce; your sister is waiting for me.” “Let her wait,” calmly. “It’s beastly cold outside; I am sure the fire will be a comfort. Sit down for a moment.” “I mustn’t,” Marjorie’s color, made brilliant by the wind outside, deepened to a warmer tint as she caught his eyes. “Janet and Baron von Valkenberg are waiting in the motor for me; we are going down to the Basin to skate. The river is frozen over, you know. Good-bye,” and she vanished through the doorway. “D--mn! they might have asked me to go along!” Duncan threw a fresh log on the fire as a slight vent to his feelings, then strolled over to the window opening on Sheridan Circle. He was just in time to see Marjorie assisted into the waiting motor by Chichester Barnard. Duncan drew back, stung to the quick, and making his way to the table, dropped into his father’s revolving chair. For a time he sat blindly scratching marks on a pad, then threw down his pencil in disgust. “The only woman!” he muttered, and his clenched hands parted slowly. As he rose to leave the room his eyes fell on a small pile of bank notes lying on the floor where he had knocked them some minutes before. He gathered them up, and paused idly to count the bills.... “Nine tens, ten tens, one hundred; one ten----” his hand remained suspended in the air; surely Marjorie had mentioned one hundred and fifty dollars? Where was the odd forty? He went slowly over the bills again, with the same result--one hundred and ten dollars.