“I own a French car and drive it myself,” I said, “and—­but I see there’s no use of my saying anything.”

“It’s genius with Gerard,” she said.  “It makes one solemn to think how much he knows about gas engines.”

“So that’s how he did it!” I observed.  “Different men have different ways to charm, I suppose.  I don’t remember that looks were his long suit.”

“If you were a woman, that would be called catty.”

“Oh, I don’t want to detract from him,” I said.  “He used to dance with wall-flowers and they said he was an angel to his sister.”

“It was that sister who was the real trouble,” she said meditatively.

“What had she to do with it?” I asked.

“Oh, just being there—­being his sister—­being an invalid, yon know.”

“No, I don’t know, at all.”

“The trouble is, I’m telling you the end of the story first.”

“Let’s start at the very beginning.”

“In real life beginnings and middles and ends of things are all so jumbled up.”

“When I went away,” I said, “everybody thought it was Harry Clayton, with the Englishman as a strong second, and there wasn’t any Malcolm about it.”

“Do yon remember the flurry in Great Westerns?” she asked.

“That’s surely the beginning of something else,” I remarked,

“No, it’s the beginning of this.”

I’ve a faint memory they jumped up to something tremendous, didn’t they?”

“It was the biggest thing of its kind ever seen on Wall Street.”

“Wall Street!” I exclaimed.  “The voice is Jess Hardy’s, but—­”

“Well, you can’t buy a Manton car without a little trouble.”

“Or twenty-five hundred dollars in a certified check.”

“It’s nearer three thousand, with acetylene lamps, top, baskets, extra tires, French tooter, freight, insurance, extra tools and a leather coat.”

“You’ve got the thing down fine,” I said.  “You speak like a folder.”

“Well, I didn’t have any three thousand dollars,” she continued, undisturbed; “all I had was an allowance of a hundred a month, a grand piano, a horse (you remember my, blood mare, Gee-whizz?) a lot of posters, and a father.”

“He seems to me the biggest asset of the lot,” I observed.

“I thought so, too, till I tried him,” she said.  “He had the automobile fever, too—­only the negative kind—­wanted to shoot them with a gun.”

“Surely it’s dangerous enough already, without adding that.”

“For a time I didn’t know what to do,” she went on.  “I thought I’d have to try the stage, or write one of those Marie Bashkirtseff books that shock people into buying them by thousands—­and whenever I saw a Manton on the road my eyes would almost pop out of my head.  Then, when I was almost desperate, Mr. Collenquest came on a visit to papa.”

“I see now why you said Wall Street,” I remarked.