“And I made you—simply made you, you didn’t want to—get me one of those foolish little pitchers.” She pursued her theme relentlessly. “The waiter was so funny!” Nancy laughed merrily as at some droll recollection, “Phil, that was a whole year ago.”
“Nonsense!” said Phil, indignantly. “It’s ten years ago, if it’s a day! Before you grew to be a worldly-wise old lady, and before I had become a cynical old man.”
“You don’t look very old, Phil.”
“Well, I am; I’m as old as the hills. Do you know it has all been an awful pity, Nance?”
“What?” she asked, very softly, smiling adorably.
“Oh, everything——” He stopped short, the smile had escaped him. “Come,” he said, abruptly, “let’s talk about the weather, the—the—what a terrible winter it has been, hasn’t it? Did you have lots of skating up in the country?”
“Yes, lots—about two months too much of it, and it has been the worst winter I ever hope to live through; but really, Phil, I didn’t come to New York to talk about the weather.” The laughter died out of Nancy’s blue eyes. “I—I think I came to New York to ask your advice about something.”
“My advice?” echoed Phil, wonderingly.
“Yes, I think so. Phil, suppose there, was a girl whose father had lost all his money and then had gone to work and died, and had left her and her mother just this side of the poorhouse. And suppose she and her mother had had to pinch and scrimp to keep their heads above the water, until they were sick of the whole business. And suppose a man with shoals of money—a fat, sort of elderly man, who wore diamond rings, and said ‘you was,’ and did lots of other things you and I don’t like, yet was very kind and good—suppose this man wanted to marry this girl. Now, what would you advise her to do, if her mother were secretly crazy to have her marry him?”
“And she didn’t care for anyone else?” Philip’s tone was coldly judicial.