"Certainly, dear girl." And H. R. deftly piloted her out of the crush.
They stopped dancing, and he gave her his arm. She took it.
"Grace," he said, "when will you marry me?"
"Never!" she answered, determinedly. "And you must not call me Grace."
"Right-O!" he said, gratefully. "I'll call to-morrow afternoon. Shall I
speak to Bishop Phillipson, or will father--"
"I said _never_!" she frowned.
"I heard you," he smiled, reassuringly. "I--"
Andrew Barrett and the reporters came up to him.
"What about the men that fell for the beer?"
"Oh, give 'em the left-over grub, if you boys think it's right. But
don't print it. The W. C. T. U. would howl at the thought of giving food
to people who had first wanted booze."
Grace looked on, marveling at the way he ordered things done and at the
way men listened to his words.
"But what about that ten-thousand-dollar cash to the coupon-holders?"
asked young Mr. Lubin, finally taking his eyes off the beautiful
capitalist. Feeling that he was beginning to condone with capitalistic
crimes, he spoke sternly to H. R. in self-defense.
"Oh yes!" said H. R. and turned to Grace. "My dear, I'll have to leave
you. Shall I take you to mother?"
Reggie Van Duzen saved him the trip.
"Say, Mr. Rutgers, could I have--"
"Yes, my boy!" gratefully smiled H. R. He shook hands with Reggie and
said, very seriously, "_I leave her in your care!_"
Reggie, who was very young and careless, flushed proudly. Here was a man
who understood men! He would protect Grace with his life. And it gave
him a new respect for other women.
"I don't blame you, Grace," he said, with his twelve-year-old's smile
that clung to him through life and made even poor people like him. "He
is a wonder! Beekman Rutgers had the nerve to tell me that all the
Rutgerses are like H. R. What do you think of that?"