At the same moment Mrs. Prohack entered the room.

“Oh!” cried she, affecting to be surprised at the presence of Ozzie.

“Wife!” said Mr. Prohack, “Mr. Oswald Morfey has done you the honour to solicit the hand of your daughter in marriage.  You are staggered!

“How ridiculous you are, Arthur!” said Mrs. Prohack, and impulsively kissed Ozzie.

VI

The wedding festivities really began the next evening with a family dinner to celebrate Sissie’s betrothal.  The girl arrived magnificent from the Grand Babylon, escorted by her lover, and found Mrs. Prohack equally magnificent—­indeed more magnificent by reason of the pearl necklace.  It seemed to Mr. Prohack that Eve had soon become quite used to that marvellous necklace; he had already had to chide her for leaving it about.  Ozzie also was magnificent; even lacking his eye-glass and ribbon he was magnificent.  Mr. Prohack, esteeming that a quiet domestic meal at home demanded no ceremony, had put on his old velvet, but Eve had sharply corrected his sense of values—­so shrewishly indeed that nobody would have taken her for the recent recipient of a marvellous necklace at his hands—­and he had yielded to the extent of a dinner-jacket.  Charlie had not yet come.  Since the previous afternoon he had been out of town on mighty enterprises, but Sissie had seen him return to the hotel before she left it, and he was momently expected.  Mr. Prohack perceived that Eve was treating Ozzie in advance as her son, and Ozzie was responding heartily:  a phenomenon which Mr. Prohack in spite of himself found agreeable.  Sissie showed more reserve than her mother towards Ozzie; but then Sissie was a proud thing, which Eve never was.  Mr. Prohack admitted privately that he was happy—­yes, he was happy in the betrothal, and he had most solemnly announced and declared that he would have naught to do with the wedding beyond giving a marriage gift to his daughter and giving his daughter to Ozzie.  And when Sissie said that as neither she nor Ozzie had much use for the state of being merely engaged the wedding would occur very soon, Mr. Prohack rejoiced at the prospect of the upset being so quickly over.  After the emotions and complications of the wedding he would settle down to simplicity,—­luxurious possibly, but still simplicity:  the plain but perfect.  And let his fortune persist in accumulating, well it must accumulate and be hanged to it!

“But what about getting a house?” he asked his daughter.

“Oh, we shall live in Ozzie’s flat,” said Sissie.

“Won’t it be rather small?”

“The smaller the better,” said Sissie.  “It will match our income.”

“Oh, my dear girl,” Eve protested, with a glance at Mr. Prohack to indicate that for the asking Sissie could have all the income she wanted.  “And I’ll give you an idea,” Eve brightly added.  “You can have this house rent free.”