Thus he sat and thus he looked, when Miram Monroe, the genteel ghost, was ushered in for a chat and to take dinner. When he saw who his visitor was, Mr. Jarney laid down his paper, crossed his left leg over his right, and leaned back in his chair, in such a resigned state of studied equanimity (always his pose in the presence of Monroe) that Monroe felt he must let loose one of his evanescent smiles.
"Have a seat," said Mr. Jarney, in his familiar way of greeting Monroe; "dinner will be ready soon."
"Thank you," said Monroe, as he stiffly bent himself into the capacious depths of an arm chair, sitting near.
Monroe was faultlessly groomed. He wore an evening suit, and had a diamond in a shirt front that looked no more starched than his frosted face.
"My daughter will be down tonight for the first time to take dinner with the family," said Mr. Jarney, in a conversational mood. "She is improving rapidly, Mr. Monroe; rapidly; and you don't know, being a bachelor, how much I am relieved of worry since she began to mend."
"I imagine how one would feel," said the feeling Monroe, now inwardly cogitating over how to approach the subject that brought him there on this occasion.
Having no hint of Mr. Monroe's intentions, Mr. Jarney proceeded:
"Yes; she has improved so rapidly lately that I feel, myself, like coming out of a long illness. My daughter and I are planning a trip, Monroe, just as soon as she is quite able."
"A trip!" said Monroe, without expressing his surprise in his visage.
"We had thought of going to Europe," pursued Mr. Jarney; "but my business affairs are such that I cannot leave here this summer."