ustees, but to the
folly of the professor. She disapproved of most of Ben's friends, and
would have despised his paper if she ever read it. The only good
thing about it in her estimation was, he seemed to be able "to knock
a living out of it"--a process which Nora regarded with a sort of gay
casualness. She did not blame him for making so little money and
thus keeping her housekeeping cramped, but she never in her own mind
doubted that it would be far better if he had more. The idea that
David was about to marry money seemed to her simply the reward of
virtue--her own virtue in bringing David up so well. She knew that Mr.
Cord opposed the marriage, but she supposed that Ben would arrange all
that. She had great confidence in Ben. Still he was very young, very
young, so she gave him a word of advice as she put his bag into his
hand.

"Don't take any nonsense. Remember you're every bit as good as they.
Only don't, for goodness' sake, Mr. Ben, talk any of your ideas to
them. A rich man like Mr. Cord wouldn't like that."

Ben laughed. "How would you like me to bring you home a lovely heiress
of my own?" he said.

She took a thread off his coat. "Only don't let her come interfering
in my kitchen," she said, and hurried him away. He had a good deal of
courage, but he had not enough to tell Nora he was going to Newport to
stop her darling's marriage.

The Newport boat gets to Newport about two o'clock in the morning, and
experienced travelers, if any such choose this method of approach, go
on to Fall River and take a train back to Newport, arriving in time
for a comfortable nine-o'clock breakfast. But Ben was not experienced,
and he supposed that when you took a boat for Newport and reached
Newport the thing to do was to get off the boat.

It had been a wonderful night on the Sound, and Ben had not been to
bed, partly because, applying late on a Friday evening, he had not
been able to get a room, but partly because the moon and the southerly
breeze and the silver shores of Long Island and the red and white
lighthouses had been too beautiful to leave. Besides, he had wanted to
think out carefully what he was going to say to his brother.

To separate a man from the woman he loves, however unwisely, has some
of the same disadvantages as offering a bribe--one respects the other
person less in proportion as one succeeds. What, Ben said to himself,
could he urge against a girl he did not know? Yet, on the other hand,
if he h