“Where are you going?” questioned Freddy at this point, feeling that as a grown man he must bear his part of the chat.
“Look here, littleun,” said Mr. Potter, “if you expect me to talk to you back there, you—” At this point he suddenly ceased speaking, as if something more interesting than his unfinished remark had occurred to him.
“Freddy found it too warm by the fire,” explained Frances hastily, guilty at heart, if to outward appearance brazen. But Mr. Potter did not hear what she said, and sat looking into the fire with a suddenly serious look, which nevertheless had a laugh not very far underneath.
After quite a pause, Frances said: “How entertaining you are!”
“Yes,” assented Mr. Potter, coming back from his thoughts; “I always enjoy myself, and I find that other people do the same.” Then he again relapsed into meditation.
“Isn’t he just as horrid as can be?” raged Frances, inwardly. “He believes just because some women think him clever, and because men like him, and because he’s a good business man, and because mama’s always praising him to his face, as she would any one who was papa’s partner, that he is perfect. And no matter how you try to snub him, he is so conceited that he won’t see it. Horrid old thing!” Aloud she asked, “What are you thinking about?”
Mr. Potter laughed. “That’s a great secret,” he asserted.
⁂
An hour later, Mr. Potter was seated in a library, smoking, with a glass of seltzer—and something else—at his elbow. Opposite to him sat a man of perhaps twice his years, equally equipped with a cigar and seltzer—and something else.
“Well,” remarked the senior, “I think if we can get the whole issue at 82½ and place them at 87 and accrued interest, we had better do it.”