“Rubbish!” said Dorothy.  “It’s what you do, not what she does, that makes the trouble.  You look at a woman with those grave eyes and that stern jaw of yours, and we all feel that we are fools on the spot, and really become so.  I never stopped being afraid of you till I found out that in reality you were afraid of me.  You know you are.  You are afraid of all women.”

“He isn’t a bit afraid of women,” affirmed Leonore.

Just then Mr. Beekman came up.  “Er—­Mrs. Rivington.  You know this is—­er—­a sort of house-warming, and they tell me we are to go over the house, don’t you know, if we wish.  May I harve the pleasure?”

Dorothy conferred the boon.  Peter looked down at Leonore with a laugh in his eyes.  “Er—­Miss D’Alloi,” he said, with the broadest of accents, “you know this,—­er—­is a sort of a house-warming and—­” He only imitated so far and then they both laughed.

Leonore rose.  “With pleasure.  I only wish Mrs. Grinnell had heard you.  I didn’t know you could mimic?”

“I oughtn’t.  It’s a small business.  But I am so happy that I couldn’t resist the temptation.”

Leonore asked, “What makes you so happy?”

“My new friend,” said Peter.

Leonore went on up the stairs without saying anything.  At the top, however, she said, enthusiastically:  “You do say the nicest things!  What room would you like to see first?”

“Yours,” said Peter.

So they went into the little bedroom, and boudoir, and looked over them.  Of course Peter found a tremendous number of things of interest.  There were her pictures, most of them her own purchases in Europe; and her books and what she thought of them; and her thousand little knick-knacks of one kind and another.  Peter wasn’t at all in a hurry to see the rest of the house.

“These are the photographs of my real friends,” said Leonore, “except yours.  I want you to give me one to complete my rack.”

“I haven’t had a photograph taken in eight years, and am afraid I have none left.”

“Then you must sit.”

“Very well.  But it must be an exchange.”  Peter almost trembled at his boldness, and at the thought of a possible granting.

“Do you want mine?”

“Very much.”

“I have dozens,” said Leonore, going over to her desk, and pulling open a drawer.  “I’m very fond of being taken.  You may have your choice.”

“That’s very difficult,” said Peter, looking at the different varieties.  “Each has something the rest haven’t.  You don’t want to be generous, and let me have these four?”

“Oh, you greedy!” said Leonore, laughing.  “Yes, if you’ll do something I’m going to ask you.”

Peter pocketed the four.  “That is a bargain,” he said, with a brashness simply disgraceful in a good business man.  “Now, what is it?”

“Miss De Voe told me long ago about your savings-bank fund for helping the poor people.  Now that I have come into my money, I want to do what she does.  Give a thousand dollars a year to it—­and then you are to tell me just what you do with it.”