"All very well in that generation-—ces bons jours quand nous etions
si miserables," said Gerald, in his low, maundering voice.
"Prosperity means the lack of object."

"Does it?"

"In these days when everything is used up."

"Not to those two—-"

"Happy folk, never to lose the sense of achievement!"

"Poor old man! You talk as if you were twenty years older than Uncle
Lance."

"I sometimes think I am, and that I left my youth at Fiddler's
Ranch."

Wherewith he strolled to the piano, and began to improvise something
so yearning and melancholy that Anna was not sorry when her uncle
came back and mentioned the tune the old cow died of.

Was Gerald, the orphan of Fiddler's Ranch, to be always the spoilt
child of prosperity and the creature of modern life, with more
aspirations than he saw how to fulfil, hampered as he was by duties,
scruples, and affections?