Eveleth, I believe," he said, when he had surveyed her well. "Have the goodness to sit down, and tell me what I can do for you."
Diane took the seat he indicated, which left a discreet space between them. The heavy black satchel she carried she placed on the floor beside her. When she raised her veil, Mr. van Tromp observed to himself that the pale face, touching in expression, and the brown eyes, in which there seemed to lurk a gentle reproach against the world for having treated her so badly, were exactly what he would have expected in a woman coming to borrow money.
"I've come to you, Mr. van Tromp," Diane began, timidly, "because I thought that perhaps—you might know—who I am."
"I don't know anything at all about you," was the not encouraging response.
"Of course there's no reason why you should—" Diane hastened to say, apologetically.
"None whatever," he assured her.
"Only that a good many people do know us—"
"I dare say. I haven't the honor to be among the number."
"And I thought that possibly—just possibly—you might be predisposed in my favor."
"A banker is never predisposed in favor of any one—not even his own flesh and blood."
"I didn't know that," Diane persisted, bravely, "otherwise I might just as well have gone to anybody else."
"Just as well."
"Would you like me to go now?"
The question took him by surprise, and before replying he looked at her again with queer, bulgy eyes peering through big circular glasses, in a way that made Diane think of an ogre in a fairy tale.
"You're not here for what I like," he said at last, "but for what you want yourself."
"That's true," Diane admitted, ruefully, "but I might go away. I will go away, if you say so."
"You'll please yourself. I didn't send for you, and I'll not tell you to go. How old are you?"
It was Diane's turn to be surprised, but she brought out her age promptly.
"Twenty-four."
"You look older."
"That's because I've had so much trouble, perhaps. It's because we're in trouble that I've come to you, Mr. van Tromp."
"I dare say. I didn't suppose you'd come to ask me to dinner. There are not many days go by without some one expecting me to pull him out of the scrape he would never have got into if it hadn't been for his own fault."
"I'm afraid that's very like my case."
"It's like a good many cases. You're no exception to the rule."
"And what do you do at such times, if I may ask?"
"You may ask, but I'll not tell you. You're here on your own business, I presume, and not on mine."
"I thought that perhaps you'd be good enough to make mine yours. Though we've never met, I have seen you at various times, and it always seemed to me that you looked kind; and so—"
"Stop right there, ma'am!" he cried, putting up a warning hand. "'Most important business,' was what you said in your note, otherwise I shouldn't have consented to see you. If you have any business, state it, and I'll say yes or no, as it strikes me. But I'll tell you beforehand that there isn't a chance in a thousand but what it'll be no."
"I did come because I thought you looked kind," Diane declared, indignantly, "and if you think it was for any other reason whatever, you're absolutely mistaken."
"Then we'll let it be. I can't help my looks, nor what you think about them. The point is that you're here for something; so let's know what it is."
"You make it very hard for me," Diane said, almost tearfully, "but I'll try. I must tell you, first of all, that we've lost a great deal of money."
"That's no new situation."
"It is to me; and it's even more so to my poor mother-in-law. I should think you must have heard of her at least. She is Mrs. Arthur Eveleth. Her maiden name was Naomi de Ruyter, of New York."
"Very likely."
"Her husband was related, on his mother's side, to the Van Tromps—the same family as your own."
"That's more likely still. There are as many Van Tromps in New York as there are shrimps on the Breton coast, and they're all related to me, because I'm supposed to have a little money."
"I sha'n't let you offend me," Diane said, stoutly, "because I want your help."
"That's a very good reason."
"But since you take so little interest in us I will not attempt to explain how it is that we've come to such misfortune."
"I'll take that for granted."
"The blow has fallen more heavily on my mother-in-law than on me. She has lost everything she had in the world; while I have still my own money—my dot—and a little over from the sale of my jewels."
"Well?"
"If you'd ever seen her, you would know how terrible, how impossible, such a situation is for her. She's the sort of woman who ought to have money—who must have money. And so I thought if I came to you—"
"I'd give her some."
"No," Diane said, quickly, with a renewed touch of indignation, "but that you'd help me to do it."
He looked at her with an odd, upward glance under his shaggy, overhanging brows, while the protruding lower lip went a shade further out.
"Help you to do it? How?"
"By letting her have mine."
Again he looked at her, almost suspiciously.
"You've got plenty to give away, I suppose?"
"On the contrary, I've pitifully little; but such as it is, I want her to have it all. She could live on it—with economy; or at least she says I could."
"And can't you?"
"I don't want to. As there isn't enough for two, I wish to settle it on her. Isn't that the word?—settle?"
"It'll do as well as another. And what do you propose to do yourself?"
"Work."
Diane forced the word in a little gasp of humiliation, but she got it out.
"And what'll you work at?"
"I don't know yet, exactly. I shall have to see. My mother-in-law is going to America; and when she does I'll join her."
"Humph!
