“Have you had any other dreams?” asked Constance casually.

“Yes,” replied Mildred, “but not like the one that depressed me.  Last night I had a very pleasant dream.  It seemed that I was breakfasting with Mr. Davies.  I remember that there was a hot coal fire in the grate.  Then suddenly a messenger came in with news that United Traction had advanced twenty points.  Wasn’t it strange?”

Constance said nothing.  In fact it did not seem strange to her at all.  The strange thing to her, now that she was a sort of amateur dream reader herself, was that Mrs. Caswell did not seem to see the real import of her own dream.

“You have seen Mr. Davies to-day?” Constance ventured.

Mrs. Caswell laughed.  “I wasn’t going to tell you.  You seemed so set against speculating in Wall Street.  But since you ask me, I may as well admit it.”

“When did you see him before?” went on Constance.  “Did you have much invested with him already?”

Mrs. Caswell glanced up, startled.  “My—­you are positively uncanny, Constance.  How did you know I had seen him before?”

“One seldom dreams,” said Constance, “about anything unless it has been suggested by an event of the day before.  You saw him today.  That would not have inspired the dream of last night.  Therefore I concluded that you must have seen him and invested before.  Madame Cassandra’s mention of him yesterday caused the dream of last night.  The dream of last night probably influenced you to see him again to-day, and you invested in United Traction.  That is the way dreams work.  Probably more of conduct than we know is influenced by dream life.  Now, if you should get fifteen or twenty points you would be in a fair way to join the ranks of those who believe that dreams do come true.”

Mrs. Caswell looked at her almost alarmed, then attempted to turn it off with a laugh, “And perhaps breakfast with him?”

“When I do set up as interpreter of dreams,” answered Constance simply, “I’ll tell you more.”

On one point she had made up her mind.  That was to visit Mr. Davies herself the next day.

She found his office a typical bucket shop, even down to having a section partitioned off for women clients of the firm.  She had not intended to risk anything, and so was prepared when Mr. Davies himself approached her courteously.  Instinctively Constance distrusted him.  He was too cordial, too polite.  She could feel the claws hidden in his velvety paw, as it were.  There was a debonnaire assurance about him, the air of a man who thought he understood women, and indeed did understand a certain type.  But to Constance, who was essentially a man’s woman, Davies was only revolting.

She managed to talk without committing herself, and he in his complacency was glad to hope that he was making a new customer.  She had to be careful not to betray any of the real and extensive knowledge about Wall Street which she actually possessed.  But the glib misrepresentations about United Traction quite amazed her.