asked, "Why should any one want to be sophisticated?"
"Whether we want to be or not, this boy's crudeness may show up against it."
"That doesn't sound in the least like you, Merry."
He flushed. "I'm being perfectly frank with you. I don't want her to love him."
She surveyed him with open eyes. "So that's it. You've fallen in love with her yourself."
"Perhaps I have not gone quite that far. But I know this, that I don't want any one else to have her."
Miss Anne threw up her hands in a little gesture of despair. "Life is like the House that Jack Built—Sally is in love with you, you are in love with Hildegarde, Hildegarde is in love with Crispin—"
He smiled at her. "I fancy that none of us has gone as far as you think."
"But you have gone far enough." Miss Anne sat staring into the fire. Years ago, family pride had separated her from the man she wanted to marry. Because of that, her life was incomplete. "I'll have nothing to do with Hildegarde's love-affairs," she declared. "Let her choose for herself."
"By all means," Meriweather agreed. "And now, shall we talk about Louis? You said this morning that you wanted a minute with me to discuss him."
"I am worried about his finances. This Christmas party seems to me a mad extravagance. He can't afford it, Merry."
"He says he might as well be killed for a sheep as a lamb."
"But what does he expect to get out of it?"
