"Yes," said Presbury amiably. "It's nothing like yours was. He's so rich he doesn't know what to do with his income. He owns mines scattered all over the world. And if they all failed, he's got bundles of railway stocks and bonds, and gilt-edged trust stocks, too. And he's a comparatively young man—hardly fifty, I should say. He pretends to be forty."
"It's strange I never heard of him," said Mrs. Presbury.
"If you went to South America or South Africa or Alaska, you'd hear of him," said Presbury. He laughed. "And I guess you'd hear some pretty dreadful things. When I knew him twenty-five years ago he had just been arrested for forging my father's name to a check. But he got out of that—and it's all past and gone. Probably he hasn't committed any worse crimes than have most of our big rich men. Bill's handicap has been that he hadn't much education or any swell relatives. But he's a genius at money-making." Presbury looked at Mildred with a grin. "And he's just the husband for Mildred. She can't afford to be too particular. Somebody's got to support her. I can't and won't, and she can't support herself."
"You'll go—won't you, Mildred?" said her mother. "He may not be so bad."
"Yes, I'll go," said Mildred. Her gaze was upon the untouched food on her plate.
"Of course she'll go," said Presbury. "And she'll marry him if she can. Won't you, miss?"
He spoke in his amiably insulting way—as distinguished from the way of savagely sneering insult he usually took with her. He expected no reply. She surprised him. She lifted her tragic eyes and looked fixedly at him. She said:
"Yes, I'll go. And I'll marry him if I can."
"I told him he could have you," said Presbury. "I explained to him that you were a rare specimen of the perfect lady—just what he wanted—and that you, and all your family, would be grateful to anybody who would undertake your support."
Mrs. Presbury flushed angrily. "You've made it perfectly useless for her to go!" she cried.