With a frown, a laugh, and a shy look of sympathy at him, Edith said,
"I don't see but you have got to find out your mistake for yourself.
Time and facts cure many follies." But she found little encouragement
in his incredulous smile.
The next moment she turned upon him so sharply that he was startled.
"I am a business woman," she said, "and conduct my affairs on business principles. You said, I think, you would help me find a market for the produce of my place?"
"Certainly," he replied.
"As certainly you must take fifteen per cent commission on all sales."
"Oh, Miss Allen," commenced Arden, "I couldn't—"
"There," said she, decisively, "you haven't the first idea of business. Not a thing can you touch unless you comply with my conditions. There is no sentiment, I assure you, connected with currants and cabbages."
"You may be certain, Miss Allen, that I would comply with any condition," said Arden, with the air of one who is cornered, "but let me suggest, since we are arranging this matter so strictly on business grounds, that ten per cent is all I should take. That is the regular commission, and is all I pay in sending produce to New York."
"Oh, I didn't know that," said the experienced and uncompromising woman of business, innocently. "Do you think that would pay you for your trouble?"
"I think it would," he replied, so demurely and yet with such a twinkle in his blue eyes, that now looked very different with the light of hope and happiness in them, that Edith turned away with a laugh.