There was to be no New Year's party at the Wheaton mansion this year. "No!" sneered Miss Angelina, "for they disposed of the oldest old maid at the last, and probably expect to get rid of the second at somebody else's ball this year."
I am sure Miss Angelina need not have sneered so, because she tried hard enough to get old Toots herself. But that is neither here nor there; Miss Tilly had received a proposal at that New Year's ball, and Miss Fanny her solitaire—from her father, to be sure; but then that was better than not to receive any. Old Toots, proud husband of the peerless Tilly now for many months, was not old at all, and his name wasn't Toots either. His name was Jacob Udderstrome; and in early days he had been the proprietor of a milk ranch, and having used a tin trumpet for the purpose of making known his coming to the more tardy of his customers, he had been honored with the unromantic appellation without his particular wish or consent. When the country had become more settled Jacob sold out, and being possessed of a great deal of natural shrewdness and a native talent for keeping his mouth shut, he had doubled and trebled his money by simply buying up real estate and selling at the right time.
Fanny was still languishing for the right one; she could never think of entertaining less than a hundred thousand, when Tilly had gotten at least three times that amount. Father and mother seldom interfered with any of their daughters' plans or pleasures, and only once in the course of the past year had Papa Wheaton been seriously displeased. On this occasion he had Lola called into the room, and demanded sternly of her why she had refused the hand and fortune of Hiram Watson? He looked quite fierce and kept brushing up the ridge of hair on his head stiffer and stiffer, till at last it stood alone. Then Lola ventured to ask, "Are you speaking of Mr. Watson the tobacconist?"
"Tobacconist? To be sure I am; a tobacconist isn't to be sneezed at when he's got a cool half million to back him."
"It was not that I spoke of; I have only to say that I could feel nothing more than respect for him; and I will never marry where I cannot give my heart with my hand."
"That's your notion of what's right, is it? What, do you tell me, when I've spent more money on your education than both your sisters together ever cost me, that you can't marry a worthy, solid man because he won't write sentimental love-letters? I tell you—"
He was talking himself into a rage and turning purple in the face, when his wife entered, and, like the good, quiet angel she always was, put an end to the interview and the father's anger with her favorite child.
Lola told Charlie of the interview, and he thanked her for her devotion, and strengthened her resolution by such words as only Charlie could utter—so full of the heart's deep love and the warmth of a rich chivalrous nature. "On Christmas day, my love," he said, "I shall be able to step boldly before your father and claim you for my wife. I am all but a rich man now, thanks to old Bingham's prompting and the secrecy observed, which has left this thing entirely in our own hands. I have the field almost to myself, and shall realize within the next three months such a fortune as I had never dreamed of possessing."