friendship was put in real jeopardy, and that was when her parents
decided they could not die happy unless we made a match of it.
This was embarrassing for both of us, and for a while she treated
me very coldly. But we had it out together one evening in the
library and decided to let the matter make no difference to us,
going on as before the best of friends. I was the last person to
expect a girl of eighteen to care for a man of forty, particularly
one like myself, ugly and grey-haired, who had long before outworn
the love of women. In fact I had to laugh, one of those sad laughs
that come to us with the years, at the thought of anything so
absurd; and I soon got her to give up her tragic pose and see the
humour of it all as I did. So we treated it as a joke, rallied the
old folks on their sentimental folly, and let it pass.

It set me thinking, however, a great deal about the girl and her
future, and I managed to make interest with several of my friends
and get her invited to some good houses. Of course it was
impossible to carry the old people into this galere. They were
frankly impossible, but fortunately so meek and humble that it
never occurred to them to assert themselves or resent their
daughter going to places where they would have been refused. Uncle
Gingersnaps would have paid money to stay at home, and Mrs.
Grossensteck had too much homely pride to put herself in a false
position. They saw indeed only another reason to be grateful to
me, and another example of my surpassing kindness. Pretty, by no
means a fool, and gowned by the best coutourieres of Paris, Teresa
made quite a hit, and blossomed as girls do in the social
sunshine. The following year, in the whirl of a gay New York
winter, one would scarcely have recognised her as the same person.
She had "made good," as boys say, and had used my stepping-stones