"I don't like your way, then," Nancy said wearily.

"We're both so poor, little girl,--that's one thing. If I were free and could overcome my prejudice against matrimony, and could be a little surer of my own heart and its constancy,--even then, don't you see, practical considerations would and ought to stand in our way. I couldn't support you, you couldn't possibly support me."

"I see," said Nancy. "Would you marry me If I were rich?" she said slowly.

"I already have one wife," Collier Pratt smiled. Nancy remembered afterward that he smiled oftener during this interview than at any other. "But if somebody died, and left you a million, she might possibly be disposed of."

For one moment, perhaps, his fate hung in the balance. Then he took a step forward.

"Kiss me good night, dear," he said, "and let us end this bitter and fruitless discussion."

"Kiss you good night," Nancy cried. "Kiss you good night. Oh! how dare you!--How dare you?" And she struck him twice across his mouth. "I wish I could kill you," she blazed. "Oh! how dare you,--how dare you?"

"Oh! very well," said Collier Pratt calmly, wiping his mouth with his handkerchief. "If that's the way you feel--then our pleasant little acquaintanceship is ended. I'll take my hat and stick and my child--and go."

"Your child?" Nancy cried aghast. "You wouldn't take Sheila away from me."

"I don't feel exactly tempted to leave her with you," he said deliberately. "I don't mind a woman striking me--I'm used to that; it is one of my charming wife's ways of expressing herself in moments of stress--but I do object to any but the most purely formal relations with her afterward. There is a certain degree of intimacy involved in your having charge of my child. I think I will take the little girl away with me now."

"Please, please, please don't," Nancy said. "I love her. I couldn't bear it now. You can't be so cruel."

"Better get it over," Collier Pratt said. "Will you call Hitty, or shall I?"

"Sheila is in bed," Nancy cried. "You wouldn't take her out of her warm bed to-night. I'll send her to you to-morrow at whatever hour you ask."

"I ask for her now."

There was no fight left in Nancy. She called Hitty and superintended the dressing of the little girl to its last detail. She could not touch her.

"Won't you kiss me good night, Miss Dear?" Sheila said, drowsily, as she took her father's hand at the door.

"Not to-night," Nancy said hoa.r.s.ely. "I've a bad throat, dear, I wouldn't want you to catch it."

"I don't know where I'm going," the little girl said, "but I suppose my father knows. I'll come back as soon as I can."

"Yes, dear," Nancy said. "Good-by."

Collier Pratt turned at the door and made an exaggerated gesture of farewell.

"We part more in anger than in sorrow," he said.

"Oh! Go," Nancy cried.

As the door closed upon the two Nancy sank to her knees, and thence to a crumpled heap on the floor, but remembering that Hitty would find her there shortly, and being entirely unable to regain her feet unaided, she started to crawl in the direction of her own room, and presently arrived there, and pushed the door to behind her with her heel.

CHAPTER XVIII

TAME SKELETONS

It was Sunday night, and New Year's Eve. Gaspard was preparing, and Molly and Dolly were serving a special dinner for Preston Eustace, planned weeks before on his first arrival in New York.

Before the great logs--imported by Michael for the occasion--that blazed in the fireplace, a round table was set, decorously draped in the most immaculate of fine linen, and crowned with a wreath of holly and mistletoe, from which extended red satin trailers with a present from Nancy for each guest, on the end of each. All the impedimenta of the restaurant was cleared away, and a couch and several easy chairs that Nancy kept in reserve for such occasions were placed comfortably about the room. Only the innumerable starry candles and branching candelabra were reminiscent of the room's more professional aspect.

Billy and Caroline were the first to arrive,--Caroline in pale floating green tulle, which accentuated the pure olive of her coloring, and transported Billy from his chronic state of adoration to that of an almost agonizing worship. d.i.c.k and Betty were next. He had realized the possible awkwardness of the situation for her, and had been thoughtful enough to offer to call for her. She was in defiant scarlet from top to toe, and had never looked more entrancing. Preston Eustace was to come in from Long Island where he was spending the holidays with a married sister. Michael received the guests and did the honors beamingly.

"Where's Nancy?" d.i.c.k asked, as, divested of his outer garments, he appeared without warning in the presence of the lovers. "Don't bother to drop her hand, Billy. I don't see how you have the heart to, she's so lovely to-night."

"We don't know where Nancy is," Caroline answered for him. "It seems to be all right, though. She's expected, Michael says."

"Where's Nancy?" Betty asked, in her turn, appearing on the threshold with every hair most amazingly in place.

"Coming," d.i.c.k rea.s.sured her.

"Has anybody heard from her?" Betty asked.

"Michael has, I think."

"You aren't worried about her, are you?" Caroline asked.

"Yes, I am," Betty said.

"I thought you and Nancy were rather on the outs," Caroline suggested.

"It seems odd to have you worrying about her like her maiden aunt."

"You wait till you see her, you'll be worried about her, too."

"What's wrong?" d.i.c.k asked quickly.

"She's lost Sheila for one thing. That unspeakable Collier Pratt--I hope he chokes on his dinner to-night, and I hope it's a rotten dinner--has taken the child away."

"The devil he has."

There was a step on the rickety stair.

"Hush! There she is now," Caroline cried.

"No," Betty said quietly, listening. "That's not Nancy. That's your brother, Caroline."

"I haven't heard his step for such a long time I've forgotten it,"

Billy said.

"I haven't heard it for a long time either," Betty said, her face draining of its last bit of color.

"Promises to be one of those merry little meals when everybody present is attended by a tame skeleton," Billy whispered, "except us, Caroline."