who can trace the gout in his family in an unbroken succession of bandages back for five hundred years, I had persuaded him that he could properly keep my money after winning it from me; and to-night—you have seen."
"He hasn't said a suspicious word against you to mother!" the girl encouraged. "He said something to me; but both this morning and this afternoon he had every possible chance to—expose you to mother. And he didn't."
"That's true," Preston agreed. "Of course, I was present most of the time. Still, I can't conceive his being reluctant to discuss me merely because I was present. But," he suggested with an inspiration, "although he must have expected you to warn your mother, don't you think we owe her a last chance of being directly informed about me before night? See; he is talking with her now. If you come out into the garden for a moment—"
The girl signalled her mother as she glanced about and, receiving permission, followed the young American out into the soft radiance of
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