With a hopeless gesture, Marvin got to his feet and took a pace or two up and down the veranda. The girl watched him, puzzled.
"Are they going to pay cash?" Marvin asked, pausing in front of her.
"It's much better than cash! It's shares of stock that pay ten per cent. a year! It seems almost too good to be true."
"It does—it certainly does!" came from Marvin.
The girl had risen, glowing with enthusiasm. Quite naturally she put her hand on his arm and looked up at him happily, intimately, naïvely seeking his approval.
In the midst of his perplexity Marvin's heart gave a bound. That naïve touch on his arm and the intimate light in the brown eyes told him that, in one respect at least, all was not lost—not yet! He was about to take her hands and break into a rush of words when the girl suddenly turned her attention from him, remarking, eagerly: "Here comes daddy. We were afraid he'd deserted again!"
Marvin swung around. Much as he wanted to see Lightnin' to-day, he wished, just then, that Bill could have seen fit to delay his appearance a few minutes longer. Bill Jones, however, came serenely up the steps and stood with his hands in his pockets, shrewdly and humorously inspecting the pair.
"Sorry to interrupt the billin' an' cooin'," he remarked. "But say, John, ain't you takin' some chances round here? Did you know that Blodgett's here? I seen him go up-stairs when I went out."
Millie had flushed and turned away at her foster-father's first words, but now she looked curiously from one to the other.
"What on earth do you mean, daddy?" she questioned.