Billy grinned. "I had to," he admitted. "I thought I could get some money from Uncle Monty, but he had gone away, so I had Mother's present charged to Father, and Father's present charged to Mother."
"Frenzied finance!" cried Cosden, amused in spite of his desire to disparage the boy. "You are wasting your time in college; you should be in Wall Street."
"Your advice ought to be good, Mr. Cosden," agreed Billy, "for you certainly know how to make your money work overtime. I can always tell when Uncle Monty gives me any of the tired cash he wins out of you from the gratitude it shows for getting a little rest."
Cosden did not like Billy's come-backs, and he did not like the amusement which he saw restrained in Merry's face. Still, he accepted the responsibility in large measure for putting himself on the boy's level.
"I'd like to have charge of your business education," he said significantly.
"It may come to that," the boy said with a total lack of enthusiasm. "That's the one real threat Uncle Monty always holds over me."
"You are impertinent—" Cosden realized that the ragging was going too far.
"Who began it?" was the retort.
"Who is going to invite me to have some strawberries and cream?" Merry interrupted, feeling it to be her mission to come to the rescue, and recognizing Billy's mistake in antagonizing so close a friend of his uncle.
Billy was on his feet in an instant, but Cosden was ahead of him.