The color was high in Del's cheeks and her eyes were brilliant. "You'll come out all right, Artie," said she. "I don't know just how, but you'll _do_ something, and do it well." "I'd much rather do nothing--well," said he lightly, as if not sure whether he was in earnest or not. "It's so much nicer to dream than to do." He looked at her with good-humored satire. "And you--what's the matter with your practising some of the things you preach? Why don't you marry--say, Dory Hargrave, instead of Ross?" She made a failure of a stout attempt to meet his eyes and to smile easily. "Because I don't love Dory Hargrave," she said. "But you wouldn't let yourself if you could--would you, now?" "It's a poor love that lags for let," she replied. "Besides, why talk about me? I'm 'only a woman.' I haven't any career, or any chance to make one." "But you might help some man," he teased. "Then you'd like me to marry Dory--if I could?" "I'm just showing you how vain your theorizing is," was his not altogether frank reply. "You urge me to despise money when you yourself--" "That isn't fair, Arthur. If I didn't care for Ross I shouldn't think of marrying him, and you know it." "He's so like father!" mocked Arthur. "No, but he's so like _you_," she retorted. "You know he was your ideal for years. It was your praising him that--that first made me glad to do as father and mother wished. You know father approves of him." Arthur grinned, and Del colored. "A lot father knows about Ross as he really is," said he. "Oh, he's clever about what he lets father see. However, you do admit there's some other ideal of man than successful workingman." "Of course!" said Adelaide. "I'm not so silly and narrow as you try to make out. Only, I prefer a combination of the two. And I think Ross is that, and I hope and believe he'll be more so--afterwards." Adelaide's tone was so judicial that Arthur thought it discreet not to discuss his friend and future brother-in-law further. "He isn't good enough for Del," he said to himself. "But, then, who is? And he'll help her to the sort of setting she's best fitted for. What side they'll put on, once they get going! She'll set a new pace--and it'll be a grand one."