“Then he’ll be that much better off than this young man you’re so fond of?”
“Yes, if he does nothing foolish in the mean time; but I have my doubts of the financial stability of any man who can’t pass a stock-ticker without looking at it. Wall Street exists solely for the purpose of absorbing such men’s money.”
“Mr. Marge is no fool,” said Mrs. Tramlay.
“He’s no wiser than some veterans who have had to leave their millions in the street and live on their children for ever after.”
“The Improvement Company has only about forty acres, I believe you said?”
“Just forty.”
“And two thousand an acre is the most you hope for?”
“Yes.”
“That would be eighty thousand dollars: four into eighty goes twenty times, and——”
“If I’d known you’d such a head for business I would have asked you to put a housekeeper in charge of the family, so I could have your services at the office,” said Tramlay.