"Eleven hundred and seventy dollars and fuf-fifty—fuf—five cents?" he stammered. "In Heaven's name what for, Gasmerilda—hairpins?"
"No, father," she trembled. "I have issued three or four pounds of deferred bridge certificates, and they fall due to-morrow. You certainly do not wish me to lose my social position—about the only thing I have left?"
The unhappy man gazed long and anxiously at the pale face before him, and then his heart softened, as it always had done.
"All right, my child," he sighed, as he tossed the exact amount to her across the table. Then his face grew stern.
"Gasmerilda," he said, "your extravagance having brought us to this, I may as well inform you now as at any other time that it is up to you to get us out of trouble, and I have to-day been forced to enter into negotiations with the Pactolean Trust Company by which you are to be capitalized. Hereafter, my child, you are to become a dividend-paying investment instead of twin sister to a sinking fund."
"What can you mean, father?" cried the girl, her face blanching with fear.
POOR GASMERILDA SAT WHITE-FACED
The miller thereupon recounted to her in full detail the incidents of the morning, and revealed to her astounded mind the preposterous claims he had made on her behalf.