"You would have let it slip through your fingers just the same. You're one of the young women who will always stand in their own light. I dare say, now, that if I told you I was willing to marry you myself, you wouldn't profit by the occasion."
"I should never want to profit by your loss, Mr. van Tromp."
"But suppose I could afford—to lose?"
Unable to answer him there, she held her peace, though it was a relief that, before he had time to speak again, a page-boy knocked at the door and entered with a card. Diane took it hastily and read the name.
"Tell the gentleman I can't see him," she said, with a visible effort to speak steadily.
"Wait!" the banker ordered, as the boy was about to turn. "Who is it?" Without ceremony he drew the card from Diane's hand and looked at it. "Heu!" he cried. "It's Bienville, is it? Of course you'll see him; of course you will; of course! Here, boy, I'll go with you."
Returning to Gramercy Park after this interview, the banker pottered about his apartment until, on hearing the door-bell ring, he looked out of the window and recognized Derek Pruyn's chauffeur. On the stairs, as he went down, he heard Miss Lucilla's voice in the hall.
"Oh, come in, Derek. Marion isn't here yet, but she won't be long. I asked you to come punctually, because I gathered from her note that she wanted to see you very particularly, and without Mrs. Bayford's knowledge. She has evidently something on her mind that she wants to tell you."
"Hello, dears!" the old man interrupted suddenly, as, leaning heavily on the baluster, he descended the stairs. "I've got good news for you."
"Good news, Uncle James?" Miss Lucilla said, reproachfully. With her long, grave face, and in her heavy crape, she looked as though she found good news decidedly out of place.