Billy grinned. "I had to," he admitted. "I thought I could get some money from Uncle Monty, but he had gone away, so I had Mother's present charged to Father, and Father's present charged to Mother."

"Frenzied finance!" cried Cosden, amused in spite of his desire to disparage the boy. "You are wasting your time in college; you should be in Wall Street."

"Your advice ought to be good, Mr. Cosden," agreed Billy, "for you certainly know how to make your money work overtime. I can always tell when Uncle Monty gives me any of the tired cash he wins out of you from the grat.i.tude it shows for getting a little rest."

Cosden did not like Billy's come-backs, and he did not like the amus.e.m.e.nt which he saw restrained in Merry's face. Still, he accepted the responsibility in large measure for putting himself on the boy's level.

"I'd like to have charge of your business education," he said significantly.

"It may come to that," the boy said with a total lack of enthusiasm.

"That's the one real threat Uncle Monty always holds over me."

"You are impertinent--" Cosden realized that the ragging was going too far.

"Who began it?" was the retort.

"Who is going to invite me to have some strawberries and cream?" Merry interrupted, feeling it to be her mission to come to the rescue, and recognizing Billy's mistake in antagonizing so close a friend of his uncle.

Billy was on his feet in an instant, but Cosden was ahead of him.

"I know the place," Merry said. "You see, I'm the old settler here, so I'll show you all the attractions. Think of strawberries and cream in January!--Won't you go ahead of us, Mr. Cosden, and ask the boy to put a table out on the piazza? It will be lovely there."

As Cosden moved out of earshot she turned to her companion.

"You must not upset him like that, Billy," she reproved him firmly; "your uncle will never forgive you."

"He has no right to b.u.t.t in on us," the boy protested gloomily.

"But he's here, and you must be civil to him. Think how much older he is than you are, and you're quarreling with him as if he were your own age."

"Oh, I'll be civil to him if he'll only can his grouch. Why, he got sore with me for kidding him about his age, yet you noticed how old he is yourself."

"He isn't old, Billy. Why, he's younger than Mr. Huntington, isn't he?"

"Perhaps he is; but Uncle Monty always makes you feel that he's your own age. I never think of him any differently than I do of any of my other pals. But Mr. Cosden--ugh!"

"I know, Billy; but you don't want to say anything that will queer you with your uncle, do you?"

Billy looked at her quizzically before he replied, then his broad, good-natured grin replaced the frown.

"I get you, Stevie--what's the feminine for Steve, anyhow? You mean that a fellow ought not to make _pate de foie gras_ out of the goose that lays the golden eggs.--Say, Merry, you're wonderful, you are,--simply wonderful!"

IX

On their return from the Barracks Mrs. Thatcher and Edith Stevens left the men on the piazza and went up-stairs for the ostensible purpose of lying down, but with that ease with which two women change their plans when once alone they found themselves sitting in Marian's room, engaged in a heart-to-heart conversation.

"I really think he might do," Edith remarked, a propos of nothing.

As Mrs. Thatcher was intimately acquainted with Edith's mental processes the remark was more intelligible than might have been expected.

"You don't mean Philip Hamlen?"

Edith laughed. "No; you warned me off of him yesterday. I mean Mr.

Cosden."

"At it again?" Marian laughed. "Edith, you are absolutely incorrigible!

It has been so long since you have played ducks and drakes with a man that I really believed you had reformed. You are old enough to know better!"

"I presume it will be the same with him as with the others," Edith sighed. "That is my great weakness, I admit: I like a man just so long, and then he bores me stiff. I don't see how a married woman stands it to have only one man around her all the time. If you were as honest as I am you would admit that it would be a relief to you, every now and then if you could pour out your breakfast coffee with some one else sitting in front of you instead of Harry."

"Harry answers very well, thank you."

"Habit, nothing else," Edith insisted. "He's as much a part of the family furniture as the grand piano. But that's what gives me hope: if you and so many other women can endure it, why can't I?"

"There are hundreds of men; why pick on Mr. Cosden?"

"I had a long, experimental conversation with him last night while you and Mr. Huntington were holding your revival meeting on the pier, and I really think he might do. Tell me what you know about him."

"Only what Harry has told me. They have had some business dealings together, and Harry says he has made a lot of money. The fact that Monty Huntington is his friend is his best recommendation."

"Mr. Huntington has a good social position in Boston, hasn't he?"

"Good heavens, yes! I believe one of his ancestors discovered Beacon Street, or something of that kind; but that doesn't imply that Mr.

Cosden has the same position. A bachelor may have friends at his clubs whom he does not necessarily bring into his social circle,--especially in Boston."

"Mr. Cosden is frightfully commercial," Edith meditated aloud.

"So are you," Marian broke in laughing.

"I don't mind that," Edith continued, "so long as he has a human side.

I believe I could serve as a counter-irritant to keep him from remaining merely a machine.

"You mustn't take away his capacity as provider," Marian teased her; "he would need a fairly stiff income to sail the good ship 'Edith Stevens.'"

"With everything I want costing more and everything I own yielding less, that is of vital importance, of course. But I really believe Cossie--Connie--whatever they call him, might do."

"Well, it's fine to have that all settled, my dear," Marian agreed, still showing her amus.e.m.e.nt. "Now, when are you going to break the news to him?"

"Ah! that's another question!" Edith answered, entirely unabashed.

"Couldn't you find out from Mr. Huntington something about his hobbies and his antipathies?"