"What's the harm? Take a shot at it, old chap! A young man can't collect too many kinds of experience. Take me for example!--I've sold dogs and hunters on commission, gone shares in about every rotten scheme anybody ever suggested to me, financed a show, and acted in it--as you know--and, by gad!--here I am now a dealer in old masters! Be a good fellow and come in with me. What?" "I don't really know enough about antique pictures to----" "What's the odds! Neither do I! My dear sir, we must lie like gentlemen for the honour of the Dankmere gallery! What? Along comes a chap walking slowly and painfully for the weight of the money in his pockets--'Ho!' says he--'a genuine Van Dyck!' 'Certainly,' you say, very coldly. And, 'How much?' says he, shivering for fear he mayn't get it. 'Three hundred thousand dollars,' you say, trying not to yawn in his face----" Quarren could no longer control his laughter: Dankmere blinked at him amiably. "We'll hang them anyhow, Dankmere," he said. "As long as there is so little business in the office I don't mind looking after your pictures for you----" "Yours, too," urged the Earl. "No; I can't accept anything----" "Then it's all off!" exclaimed Dankmere, turning a bright red. "I'm blessed if I'll accept charity!--even if I am hunting heiresses. I'll marry money if I can, but I'm damned if I hold out a tin cup for coppers!" "If you feel that way," began Quarren, very much embarrassed, "I'll do whatever would make you feel comfortable----" "Half interest or it's all off! A Dankmere means what he says--now and then." "One-third interest, then----" "A half!--by gad! There's a good fellow!" "No; one-third is all I'll accept." "Oh, very well. It may amount to ten dollars--it may amount to ten thousand--and ten times that, perhaps. What?" "Perhaps," said Quarren, smiling. "And, if you're going out, Dankmere, perhaps you had better order a sign painted--anything you like, of course. Because I'm afraid I couldn't leave these pictures here indefinitely and we might as well make plans to get rid of some of them as soon as possible." "Right-o! I'm off to find a painter. Leave it to me, Quarren. And when the picture-hangers come, have them hung in a poor light--I mean the pictures--God knows they need it--the dimmer the light the better. What? Take care of yourself, old chap. There's money in sight, believe me!" And the lively little Earl trotted out, swinging his stick and setting his straw hat at an angle slightly rakish. No business came to the office that sunny afternoon; neither did the picture-hangers. And Quarren, uneasy, and not caring to leave Dankmere's ancestral collection of pictures in the back yard all night lest the cats and a possible shower knock a little superfluous antiquity into them, had just started to go out and hire somebody to help him carry the canvases into the basement, when the office door opened in his very face and Molly Wycherly came in, breezily.