ost of about ten thousand
dollars. But what was that to a bride with thirty or forty millions? It
was strange her family had left them all to her and none to the boy,
even if the boy had been a little wild. But the boy was all right now.
He'd make his own fortune if life and women and the devil would let him
alone. He had made a good start already. A few more successes like "The
Man Above" would make Epstein forget several failures he had already and
unwisely produced this season. If he could get Bangs and Devon to start
work at once, on another good play--

Epstein closed his eyes, lent his Jewish soul to the spell of the music,
and dreamed on, of Art and Dollars, of Dollars and Art.

A little later, in the automobile that whirled him and Epstein out to
the wedding-reception at Devon House, Rodney Bangs briefly developed the
wedding theme.

"I suppose the reason why women cry at weddings and men feel glum is
that they know what the bride's in for," he remarked, gloomily.

Epstein grunted. "You an' me is bachelors," he reminded the momentarily
cynical youth. "Ve should vorry!"

"What I'm worrying about is Laurie," Bangs admitted.

Epstein turned to him with awakened interest.

"Vell," he demanded, "what about Laurie? He's all right, ain't he?"

"His sister has always kept a collar and leash on Laurie," Bangs
reminded him, "and Laurie has needed them both. Now she's off for Japan
on a four-months' honeymoon. The leash and collar are off, too. It's
going to be mighty interesting and rather anxious business for us to
see what a chap like Laurie does with his new freedom. His nature hasn't
changed in a year, you see, though his circumstances have," he added,
slowly. "And all his promises to Barbara are off. His year of probation
is over."

Epstein grunted again. He was fond of saying that he loved Bangs and
Laurie as if they were the sons he had never had; but he was not given
to analysis of himself or others, and he had little patience with it.
His reply showed a tolerance unusual in him.

"Vell, ve keep an eye on him, don't ve?" he predicted.

Bangs frowned.

"We'll have to do it mighty carefully," he muttered. "If Devon catches
us at it, he won't leave us an eye to keep on anything!"

Epstein grunted again.

"Ve keep him busy," he suggested, eagerly. "Start him right avay on
another play. Eh? That's the idea!"

Bangs shook his head.

"That's it," he conceded. "But Laurie has decided that he won't work