“Well, then, a sense of humor.”
“A—what?” If she had said a “top-knot,” he could not have looked more amazedly disgusted.
“A sense of humor. And he’s got common sense too. He’s poor and alone in the world and not awfully practical, but I tell you, father, there’s stuff in him that we hustlers have got to get into our families sooner or later, if we’re going to the top. And—I—am.”
“H’m. On sixty dollars a month?”
“If necessary. Oh, I don’t pretend that Ralph has done much in business yet. Few men have, at nineteen.”
“At nineteen I had been at work seven years, and had been raised six times, both in salary and position. This young feller tells me he has been at work three years, and has been raised once—in salary only.”
“And that once was since he became interested in me; there is one thing you have got to take into account, father—that Ralph with me will have a very different career from Ralph without me.”
“But, Paula, is that just your notion of a husband?”
“Ralph is just my notion of a husband.”