On the young man's twenty-fifth birthday the magnate had made him a present of a million dollars so as to put him on his feet and permit him to support a wife. If this were a hint, Paul had taken it. Though absorbed in financial undertakings of magnitude (which had included the electric street-car combination hostile to the aspirations of Emil Stuart), he had wooed and wed one of the prettiest girls in Benham, and he possessed, not many blocks away, a stately establishment of his own. He was accustomed to walk hand in hand with prosperity, and this habit was reflected in the gay and slightly self-satisfied quality of his manliness. After foiling his cousin for a few moments, with a tantalizing smile, a new idea occurred to him. He held out the newspaper, saying, "Very well then, here it is. I dare you, Lucille, to destroy it. Nothing would induce you to part with it." Lucille snatched the sheet from his hand, and her ruffled hesitation indicated that to destroy it was the last thing she had intended. In another instant she tore the newspaper into strips with an air of disdain and cast them on the floor. Delighted at the success of his taunt, Paul stooped and gathering the fragments began to piece them together. "That is only a blind. She knows she can buy a dozen copies to-morrow. Listen, Aunt Miriam, to this gem which I have rescued: 'The fair bride has a complexion of cream of alabaster, with beautiful almond-shaped eyes, and hair of black lustre, which, rising from her forehead in queenly bands, seems the natural throne of the glittering diadem in the picture, one of her choicest bridal gifts.' Could anything be more exquisite and fetching?" He gave a laugh which was almost a whoop of exultation. "No matter, Lucille," said Mrs. Wilson, coming to her daughter's rescue. "It is only envy on Paul's part. The newspapers did not make half so much of his wedding." In her own heart she did not approve of the publicity, but the sense of importance which it conveyed was not without its effect even on her. Besides, the personal description, though florid in style, was to her maternal eyes not an exaggerated estimate of her daughter's charms. "The writer was evidently under the spell of her subject," said Mr. Prentiss, gallantly. Though tolerant of banter, especially at clerical gatherings, and partial to Paul Howard as one of the young men whom he desired to draw into closer union with the church, the idea of the possibilities of the newspaper as a dispenser of benefits was still in his mind, and served to minimize the vanity, if any, of his friend's daughter. "Quite naturally, Mr. Prentiss," retorted the tormenting Paul, "for the subject gave a private audience to the writer only a few days ago."