"When I was a youngster," said Mr. Grey, "I began at the bottom of an apple tree and worked my way to the top. There I found a wasp's nest. Then I fell and broke both arms. That was a lesson to me. Don't go up for your pile, my boy. Go down. Go down into the beautiful earth, and take out the precious metals."
"Good Heavens!" exclaimed David; "you're the Mr. Grey of Denver."
"I have a car hitched on to this train," said the magnate; "I'd be very glad of your company at dinner—seven-thirty. It's not every young man that I'd invite. But seeing that you're under bond not to make love until you've made good, I can see no objection to introducing you to my granddaughter."
"Grandpa," said Miss Violet Grey, who was sixteen, spoiled, and exquisite, "make that poor boy stop off at Denver, and do something for him."
"Since when," said her grandfather, "have you been so down on apples, miss?"
"Oh," said she with an approving shudder, "all good women fear them—like so much poison."
"But," said Mr. Grey (Mr. "Iron Grey," some called him), "if I take this young fellow up, it won't be to put him down in a drawing-room, but in a hole a thousand feet deep, or thereabouts."
"And when he comes out," said she, "I shall have returned from being finished in Europe."
"Don't know what there is so attractive about these young Eastern ne'er-do-weels," said the old gentleman, "but this one has got a certain something...."
"It's his inimitable truthfulness," said she.