I. A. R. Wylie

“ It takes all my day to take care of the money and spend it justly. You have your clothes, your friends, your social obligations. And when we are together, there's always a butler or a footman to keep us company.” He began to pace restlessly the length of the great, luxurious room. “It would be absurd if it wasn't so tragic. We're just slaves to that infernal money.”
“Peter, you are absurd and tragic all in one.” ”

“ I knew Peter at Oxford; he was the best runner and rower that we had. He was as clean-limbed as—as a stag, and as tough as a rhinoceros. When he came up, he hadn't a sou—and when he had, it was his own hard-earned money. There wasn't a finer, better fellow on earth, or one with a finer future. And now what is he? He's just your husband—Mrs. Middleton's husband—without a job except that of doling out your infernal—apologize!—money and seeing that you're not cheated more than he can help. ”

“ I thought by spending my life—”
“I do not choose that my money should be squandered in trying to bring about the millennium.”
“Then—”
“And I expect you to accompany me when I wish you to do so.”
“You mean I am not much more than—than a bought lapdog!”
She laughed unsteadily.
“Susan—take care—” he stammered. “You are riding for a fall. I am not an American myself to be browbeaten even by you.”
“Peter, it is for you to take care now! One doesn't root out one's nationality, and I'm an American still—”
“I know it. You are more American than—than my wife.” ”

“ Middleton nodded—speech being still impossible.
“Well, of course it was all what Papa would have called a 'put-up job.'” She gave a warm little chuckle. “And I don't regret it a bit. Of course I knew you were dead set on me—everybody knew that; you'd have seen the yellow press large with rumors if only you had kept your eyes open. Instead, you hung round our Avenue like a lost baby elephant, and the very creases of your trousers shrieked hopeless love and all the rest of it. Now a real Yankee would have stepped right up and rung the bell and saved me a lot of bother. ”

“ You are everything that's charming. Peter seemed—devoted. It's not that; it—it's the confounded money.”
Mrs. Middleton raised a pair of beautiful eyebrows in sad bewilderment. “Money?” she echoed.
“Yes, your money.” He got up, his old indignation aflame. “You probably wont understand. You are too American. But I knew Peter three years ago, and I saw him yesterday. ”

“ She cast a suspicious glance at the toy terrier lying in serene majesty on the best cushion, and Mr. Middleton, being a man of honor, arose in defense of innocence.
“It was me, my dear,” he explained justly but ungrammatically. “I apologize; but really, it's enough to make even a human being growl.”
“What is?”
“Oh, everything—these strikes—and now my coal-shares have gone up another half.”
Mrs. Middleton returned to the happy reflection in the mirror.
“Peter, I'd like to cable that to Papa. He always said he did not believe you knew a wild-cat coal-mine from a tin tack.” ”

“ It is the money. Gregory, it's a curse.”
“That's what all millionaires say—but they cling on to it tight enough.”
“Perhaps it clings to them.” Peter smiled grimly. “It's like an old man of the sea. Two months ago I helped a poor fellow out of a bad hole—two thousand pounds, it cost me; and the next day I had made five thousand pounds in copper. And I'm a fool at it, mind you. Every wild-cat scheme I touch goes up like a rocket. ”

“ Peter shrugged his shoulders. His face was haggard and desperate.
“Deserving cases,” he said hoarsely. “Thirty-four of them—all deserving, mark you—at least they say so! Some of them terrify me. That wizened little fellow in the green-black suit is a missionary in the South Seas, and every time he comes, he has a fresh horror about some fellow who got roasted alive—on the principle that the bigger the horror the bigger the check. The large lady next him wants one hundred pounds for sending out trousers to the aborigines. ”

“ Middleton is your husband?”
“Sure, you've struck it right off, Doctor. And I've just come for five minutes of your valuable time.”
“Ah—eh—matter of personal pleasure, or professionally?”
“For what are you at home, Doctor?”
“For neither,” he rasped, his irritable fingers playing with the rim of his spectacles. “I arrived from Central Africa yesterday morning, and I told my man to admit no one.”
Mrs. Middleton laughed musically. “I reckon neither of you know how to manage a woman,” she said. “Your young fellow downstairs had a lot to say, but I just smiled at him and came right up.” ”

“ She says trousers are the first step toward Christian morality. Are they? How do I know? Never thought about it. My secretary doesn't know either. He weeds out the undeserving, and he's had two breakdowns, poor fellow!”
“And now you're going to have one.”
“I dare say. Sometimes I feel like it.”
“Does this happen every day?”
“Thirty-four is the lowest.”
Gregory rubbed his hands.
“You'll pack your trunks to-morrow and get out of this,” he said decisively. “Take twelve months shooting tigers, and then—”
“I can't.”
“Why not? You've money enough. Your wife wont object?” ”

“ When Peter said that, I knew he was just lying. So I hunted you up in the directory and came right round.”
Dr. Gregory thrust his hands into his pockets. He was cornered, and his eyes sparkled with malice and anger.
“You're the matter with him,” he announced.
Mrs. Middleton stiffened in her chair. “You mean,” she said slowly, “I have made him ill—done him harm?”
“Yes.” He faced her defiantly and then looked hastily in another direction. Mrs. Middleton had grown very pale.
“How?” she asked, scarcely above her breath.
“He married the wrong woman,” he said brutally. ”

“ Gregory ignored the protest. He drew out a stethoscope from the tail of his frock coat and slammed down the open window.
“Kindly undo your waistcoat.”
“Are you mad?”
“Tolerably sane. I'd like to hear what your heart's up to. When a man of your age goes to pieces as you've done, he gets interesting.”
Peter growled and then yielded. There seemed indeed little use in protesting. The Doctor's manner suggested violence if thwarted. Moreover Peter was feeling curiously weary and disinclined for argument. The examination lasted a quarter of an hour. Then Dr. Gregory sat back. ”

“ He said he didn't want anything, so I let him in first. Perhaps if you could come now, sir? They're getting impatient.”
Middleton went slowly toward the door. He had the broken, resigned air of a man mastered by fate. Mrs. Middleton stood in the middle of the hearthrug, her head thrown back, her eyes flashing defiance.
“Peter!”
He looked back over his shoulder.
“It's no good, dear. We've just got to see it through. Just think, thirty-four of them! My duty as steward—”
“Peter, I wont allow it. I will not be slave-driven like this. I was born a free American citizen ”

“ Although from his elevation there was not much to be seen of her save a mass of fair wavy hair and the tip of a delicate nose faintly inclined to an angle not strictly classical, the prospect should still have been sufficiently attractive to hold his attention. ”