"Yes: it does. I get awfully bored with the just-out-of-college chatter of the boys. I want to see the wheels go round, Guardy. Real wheels, that make up real machinery and get real things done. I'm not quite an ingénue, you know."
"Thirty-five, thirty, twenty-five, fifteen, three," murmured her uncle, rubbing his ear. "And does young Surtaine give you inside glimpses of the machinery of his business?"
"Sometimes. He doesn't know very much about it himself, yet."
"It's a pretty dirty business, Honey. And, I'm afraid, he's a pretty bad breed."
"The father is rather impossible, isn't he?" she said, laughing. "But they say he's very kindly, and well-meaning, and public-spirited, and that kind of thing."
"He's a scoundrelly old quack. It's a bad inheritance for the boy. Where are you off to this morning?"
"To the 'Clarion' office."
"What! Well, but, see here, dear, does Cousin Clarice approve of that sort of thing?"
"Wholly," Esmé assured him, dimpling. "It's on behalf of the Recreation Club. That's the Reverend Norman Hale's club for working-girls, you know. We're going to give a play. And, as I'm on the Press Committee, it's quite proper for me to go to the newspapers and get things printed."
"Humph!" grunted Dr. Elliot. "Well: good hunting—Pumess."