"Have you no common sense?" she demanded. "Couldn't you see that the
girl would have told me everything if you hadn't laughed, like an
idiot?"

The young man laughed again.

"By Jove!" he exclaimed, "it was enough to make a wooden Indian laugh.
The old jay with the barnacles telling us about the advantages of a
sailor's life. And Steve's face! Ho! ho!"

His mother snorted disgust. "If you had brains," she declared, "you
would have understood what he meant by saying that the sea was the place
to learn what to unlearn. He was hitting at you. Was it necessary to
insult him the first time you and he exchanged a word?"

"Insult him? HIM? Ha, ha! Why, Mater, what's the matter with you? Do you
imagine that a hayseed like that would recognize an insult without an
introduction? And, besides, what difference does it make? You don't
intend putting him on your calling list, do you?"

"I intend cultivating him for the present."

"CULTIVATING him?"

"Yes--for the present. He is Rodgers Warren's brother. That lawyer,
Graves, traveled miles to see him. What does that mean? That, in some
important way, he is connected with the estate and those two children.
If the estate is worth anything, and we have reason to believe it is,
you and I must know it. If it isn't, it is even more important that we
should know, before we waste more time. If Caroline is an heiress, if