She caught her breath and the sound brought his eyes back to her face. What he saw touched him profoundly. Indeed he felt the smart of tears under his drooping lids. "My God," he said to himself, "to have her look like that over a paltry fifteen thousand."
"Then I could send Howard to college," Agatha was saying, breathlessly.
"Sure you could."
"And there would be enough to take care of Fritz—Miss Finch, as long as she lives."
"I hope you'd do something for Hephzibah Diggs," said Warren gruffly, to hide his emotion. "That girl has something coming to her, believe me!"
Warren spent most of his leisure entertaining people, but he seldom felt better repaid than when Agatha greeted this jest with a quiver of laughter.
"I promise you she shall have a new gingham, perhaps a party dress if the money holds out."
"Yes, that's what Hephzibah would want, a party dress," said Warren. "And I speak for the first dance the first time she wears it." He went on to discuss sales and investments, and Agatha hung upon his words. He perceived that the practical line appealed to her. His tentative love-making bored and angered her. When he talked of gilt-edged first mortgages, bringing six per cent., she leaned toward him, her reddish-gold eyes melting into his, and seemed ready to leap into his arms.
The carriage he had ordered came for him at what he considered a ridiculously early hour and he kept it waiting while he explained that he would immediately take up the matter of the sale of her property with several people who might possibly be interested. She let him hold her hand while he protracted his good-by to an unconscionable length, and he argued well from this, till she disconcerted him by saying faintly, "Shall you see Mr. Forbes soon?"