Again he went on talking about his new bomb-dropper in words that I don't pretend to understand.
I understood the tone, though.
That was unmistakable. It was the rapt and utterly serious tone which a person speaks in of something that fills his whole heart. I suppose a painter would speak thus of his beloved art, or a violinist of his music, or a mother of her adored and only baby boy. I saw the young American's face light up until it was even as something inspired.
This machine of his, for dropping bombs from the clouds upon the heads of some enemy that existed if only in his imagination was "his subject." This was his all. This he lived for. Yes, that was plain to both of us. I saw Miss Million give an understanding nod of her little dark head as she said: "Yes, you haven't half set your mind on this thing, have you?"
"I guess you've hit it," said the American. Then Miss Million asked: "And where does the money part of it come in?"
Then he explained to us that, having invented the thing (it was all a pure joy apparently), now began the hard work. He had to sell the machine! He had to get it "taken up," to have it experimented with. All this would run him into more money than he had got.
He concluded simply: "That's where the Million dollars would come in so useful! And, Cousin Nellie, I am simply bound to try and get them!"
I watched my mistress's face as he made this announcement. Miss Million, I saw, was so interested that for the moment she had forgotten her own obsession, her infatuation for the Honourable Jim Burke. As well as the interest, though, there was "fight" in the grey eyes of the soldier's orphan who used to wear a blue-print uniform frock and a black straw hat with a scarlet ribbon about it.
She said: "I see what you mean. Me give you my money to play with! And what if I don't hold with investing any of uncle's money in this harum-scarum idea of yours? I am none so sure that I do hold——"
"Maybe I might have to do a little of the holding myself, Cousin Nellie," broke in the quiet, firm voice of her American cousin. "See here! What if I were to put up a tussle to get all that money away from you, whether you wanted to give it up to me to play with it or not?"