Mrs. Weatherbee started across the room, but at the table she stopped to bend over the bowl of violets, inhaling their fragrance. "Aren't they lovely and--prodigal enough to color whole fields?" Elizabeth laughed. "Frederic must have ordered wholesale, or else he forgot they were in season." Beatriz lifted her face. "Did Mr. Morganstein send these violets?" she asked. "I thought--but there was no card." "Why, I don't know," said Elizabeth, "but who else would have ordered whole fields of them?" Mrs. Weatherbee was silent, but she smiled a little as she followed Elizabeth from the room. When they reached the foot of the staircase, the lobby was nearly deserted; if the train had left any guests, they had been shown already to their rooms. The Morganstein table was at the farther end of the dining-room, but Frederic, who was watching the door when the young women entered, at once noticed the violets at Mrs. Weatherbee's belt. "Must have been sent from Seattle on that last eastbound," he commented, frowning. "Say, Marcia, why didn't you remind me to order some flowers from town?" Marcia's calculating eyes followed his gaze. "You would not have remembered she is fond of violets, and they seem specially made for her; you would have ordered unusual orchids or imported azaleas." Frederic laughed uneasily, and a purplish flush deepened in his cheeks. "I always figure the best is never too good for her. Not that the highest priced makes so much difference with her. Look at her, now, will you? Wouldn't you think, the way she carries herself, that little gray gown was a coronation robe? George, but she is game! Acts like she expects Lucky Banks to drop in with a clear fifty thousand, when the chances are he's gone back on his ten. Well," he said, rising as she approached, to draw out her chair, "what do you think about your customer now? Too bad. I bet you've spent his Alaska dust in anticipation a hundred times over. Don't deny it," he held up his heavy hand in playful warning as he resumed his chair. "Speculated some myself on what you'd do with it. George, I'd like to see the reins in your hands for once, and watch you go. You'd set us a pace; break all records." "Oh, no, no," she expostulated in evident distress. "I shouldn't care to-- set the pace--if I were to come into a kingdom; please don't think that. I have wanted to keep up, I admit; to hold my own. I have been miserably afraid sometimes of being left behind, alone, crowded out, beaten." "Beaten? You? I guess not. Bet anybody ten to one you'll be in at the finish, I don't care who's in the field, even if you drop in your traces next minute. And I bet if this sale does fall through to-night, you'll be looking up, high as ever, to-morrow, setting your heart on something else out of reach." "Out of reach?" she responded evenly, arching her brows. "You surprise me. You have led me to believe I am easy to please."