"Possibly—quite probably. Sentiment, of the sort our fathers and mothers knew, has gone out of fashion, and the money chase has made new men and women of the present generation. But some of the old longings persist for a few of us. I want a home, Jimmie, and at least a few of the things that the word stands for. Some day I hope to be able to find a woman who will take what there is left of me and give me what she can in return. I shan't ask much because I can't give much."
"I guess you have already found her," I said, with a dull pain at my heart.
"Not Polly," he denied quickly. "I couldn't get my own consent to cheat a woman like Polly Everton. She has a right to demand the best that a man can give, and all of it. Besides, it doesn't lie altogether with me or my possible leanings, in Polly's case—as no man knows better than yourself."
"Oh, you are wrong there, entirely wrong!" I hastened to say. "Polly and I are the best of good friends—nothing more."
His smile was a deal more than half sad.
"If there is 'nothing more,' Jimmie, it is very pointedly your own fault," he returned. "I've been wondering what you are waiting for. You have been poking your head into the sand like a silly old ostrich, but you haven't fooled me—or Polly, either, I think—for a single minute. What's the obstacle?"
I was silent. Not even to so close a friend as Robert Barrett could I give the real reason why my lips were sealed and must remain so. He went on, after a time, good-naturedly ignoring my hesitancy.
"It was all right at first, of course; while we couldn't tell whether we had a mine or only a costly muddle of litigation. But it's different now. We are going to beat the Lawrenceburg people in the end, and apart from that, if we should split up right here and now, we've got an undivided surplus of—how much was it yesterday?—you've got the records."
"A little under a million."
"Call it nine hundred thousand to divide among the three of us. Your share of that would at least enable you and Polly to begin light house-keeping in a five-room flat, don't you think?"