“All Mr. Lauderdale’s what?” asked Crowdie. “I didn’t quite catch—”
“The idiots—the asylum, you know.”
“Oh, yes—I remember,” said the young man, and his broad red lips smiled.
Alexander Senior, whose hand shook a little, had eaten his soup with considerable success. He glanced from Katharine to the young artist, and there was a twinkle of amusement in the kindly old eyes.
“Katharine always laughs at the idiots, and talks as though they were my personal property.” His voice was deep and almost musical still—it had been a very gentle voice in his youth.
“Not a very valuable property,” observed Alexander Junior, fixing his eye severely on the serving girl, who forthwith sprang at Mrs. Lauderdale’s empty plate as though her life depended on taking it away in time.
The Lauderdales had never kept a man-servant. The girl was a handsome Canadian, very smart in black and white.
“Wouldn’t it be rather an idea to insure all their lives, and make the insurance pay the expenses of the asylum?” enquired Crowdie, gravely looking at Alexander Junior.
“Not very practical,” answered the latter, with something like a smile.
“Why not?” asked his father, with sudden interest. “That strikes me as a very brilliant idea for making charities self-supporting. I suppose,” he continued, turning to his son, “that the companies could make no objections to insuring the lives of idiots. The rate ought to be very reasonable when one considers the care they get, and the medical attendance, and the immunity from risk of accident.”