Strange nodded.  He felt himself being wafted to New York, whether he would or no.

“Now all I have to say is this:  if, when she’s regularly started, she sees some other young fellow she likes better than you, you’re to give her up without making a fuss.”

“Of course.  Naturally, she would have to be free to do as she chose in the long run.  I’m not afraid of losing her—­”

“That’ll be your own lookout.  You’ll be on the spot, and will have as good a chance as anybody else.  You’ll have a better chance; for you’ll only have to keep what you’ve won, while any one else would have to start in at the beginning.  But it’s understood that there—­a—­can be no talk of a wedding just yet.  She must have next winter to reconsider her promise to you, if she wants to.”

Strange having admitted the justice of this, the old man rose, and held out his hand.

“We’ll keep the matter between ourselves—­in the family, I mean—­for the time being,” he said, with another slowly breaking smile; “but the ladies will want to wish you luck.  You must come into the drawing-room and see them.”

They were half-way to the door when Mr. Jarrott paused.

“And, of course, you’ll go to New York?  I didn’t think it necessary to ask you if you cared to make the change.”

With the question straight before him, Strange knew that an answer must be given.  He understood now how it is that there are men and women who find it worth their while to thrust their heads into lions’ mouths.

“Yes, sir, of course,” he answered, quietly; and they went on to join the ladies.

Part III

Miriam

XIII

On a day when Evie Colfax was nearing Southampton, and Herbert Strange sailing northward from the Rio de la Plata, up the coast of Brazil, Miriam Strange, in New York, was standing in the embrasure of a large bay-window of a fifth-floor apartment, in that section of Fifty-ninth Street that skirts the southern limit of Central Park.  Her conversation with the man beside her turned on subjects which both knew to be only preliminary to the business that had brought him in.  He inquired about her voyage home from Germany, and expressed his sympathy with “poor Wayne” on the hopelessness and finality of the Wiesbaden oculist’s report.  Taking a lighter tone, he said, with a gesture toward the vast expanse of autumn color on which they were looking down: 

“You didn’t see anything finer than that in Europe.  Come now!”

“No, I didn’t—­not in its own way.  As long as I can look at this I’m almost reconciled to living in a town.”