"I will not press you if you wish that I should not. By the way, Lowell, won't you have a cigar?"
The silver case was lifted and held upward for the young man to select one to his own liking. Half a dozen dimples played about his pretty mouth as Neil Lowell suppressed an outright laugh.
"I never smoke, thank you, sir," he answered.
"What? Oh, hang it, I always forget you are only a boy. You have so few of the frivolities of youth that I can never seem to remember that you are not an old man. I have no prejudice against smoking, though, for old or young, if not carried to excess. You must learn. It is a great comfort, and——"
Andrew Pryor paused as the door of his study was thrown open without permission, and Alice, his youngest daughter, entered.
"Papa," she cried enthusiastically, "I have just had a letter from Edith. It has been delayed somehow upon the road, and I find by comparing the dates that she will be here to-night. Isn't that just perfectly lovely? She said it would be impossible for her to tell exactly by what train she would arrive, but that we need not trouble to meet her, as her cousin would be with her, and he could bring her to the house at once, but that she would arrive in time for dinner! I am so pleased!"
She threw her arms around the old gentleman's neck, and proceeded to half suffocate him in her demonstrations of joy.
"Gwen is as happy as I am," she continued, her black eyes dancing with delight. "I have already planned a thousand different things for her entertainment. The dinner to-night must be just lovely. Don't you think I had better invite a few people, impromptu, don't you know?"
"I dare say that would be very pleasant, but I am going to Dorlan's to a stag dinner," returned Pryor sheepishly, as though knowing that his absence from home would be regarded very much as a crime.
"Oh, papa!"