y Parsons burst into the boudoir of Constance Joy, every feather on
her lavender hat aquiver with indignation. "What do you think!" she
demanded. "Johnny Gamble's lost his million dollars!"

Constance, nursing a pale-faced headache, had been reclining on the
couch at the side of a bouquet of roses four feet across; but now she
sat straight up and smiled, and the sparkle which had been absent for
days came back into her eyes.

"No!" she exclaimed. "Really, has he?"

Polly regarded her in amazement. "You act as if you are glad of it,"
she said.

"I am," confessed Constance, and breaking off one of the big red roses
she rose, surveyed herself in the glass, tried the effect of it against
her dark hair and finally pinned it on her dressing-gown.

Polly plumped into a big rocking-chair to vent her indignation.

"I don't see anything to giggle at!" she declared. "Johnny Gamble's a
friend of mine. I'm going home."

"Don't, Polly," laughed Constance. "Why, this is one of Johnny's
roses;" and she gave it an extra touch--really a quite affectionate one.

"I'm all mussed up in my mind," complained Polly in a maze of
perplexity. "Johnny Gamble made a million dollars so he could ask you
to throw away your million and marry him, and you were so tickled with
the idea that you kept score for him."

Constance smiled irritatingly.

"I kept score because it was fun. He never told me why he wanted the
money."

"You may look like an innocent kid, but you knew that much," accused
Polly.

Constance flushed, but she sat down by Polly to laugh.

"To tell you the truth, Polly, I did suspect it," she admitted.

"Yes, and you liked it," asserted Polly.

Constance flushed a little more deeply.

"It was flattering," she acknowledged, "but really, Polly, it brought
me into a most humiliating position. At the Courtneys' house-party I
overheard Mr. Courtney tell his wife that Mr. Gamble was making a
million dollars in order to marry me; and Johnny was with me at the
time!"

The hint of a twinkle appeared in Polly's indignant eyes as she began
to comprehend the true state of affairs.

"Suppose he did?" she demanded. "Everybody knew it."

Constance immediately took possession of the indignation and made it
her own.

"They had no business to know it!"

Polly smiled.

"Every place I went that day I heard the same thing," continued
Constance much aggrieved--"Johnny Gamble's million, and me, and
Gresham, and the million dollars I