herself falls short of the standard she has set for him, often does as
great and incalculable harm as the woman who has no standards at all.

Uncle Mat received a distinct shock when he reached his apartment that
night, to find that his niece, dressed in a severely plain black gown,
was dining at home alone with him. Before he finished his soup he
received another shock.

"Austin Gray is coming to New York," she said, coolly, buttering a
cracker; "I have just had a telegram saying he will take a night train,
and get in early in the morning--eight o'clock, I believe. I think I'll
go and meet him at the station. Are you willing he should come here, and
sleep on the living-room sofa, as you suggested once before, or shall I
take him to a hotel?"

"Bring him here by all means," returned her bewildered relative; "I like
that boy immensely. What streak of good luck is setting him loose? I
thought he was tied hand and foot by bucolic occupations."

"Apparently he has found some means of escape," said Sylvia; "would you
care to read aloud to me this evening?"




CHAPTER XIII


"Why, Sylvia, my dear! I never dreamed that you would come to meet me!"