an arm that was visibly trembling. "Mr. Vetsburg, for God's
sake, 'ain't I just told you how that she--harum-scarum--she--."

"Will you, Mrs. Kaufman, come or won't you? Will you, I ask you, or won't
you?"

"I--I can't, Mr.--"

"All right, then, I--I bust out now. To-day can be as good as to-morrow!
Not with my say in a t'ousand years, Mrs. Kaufman, you sign that lease! I
ain't a young man any more with fine speeches, Mrs. Kaufman, but not in a
t'ousand years you sign that lease."

"Mr. Vetsburg, Ruby--I--"

"If anybody's got a lease on you, Mrs. Kaufman, I--I want it! I want it!
That's the kind of a lease would suit me. To be leased to you for always,
the rest of your life!"

She could not follow him down the vista of fancy, but stood interrogating
him with her heartbeats at her throat. "Mr. Vetsburg, if he puts on the
doors and hinges and new plumbing in--."

"I'm a plain man, Mrs. Kaufman, without much to offer a woman what can give
out her heart's blood like it was so much water. But all these years I been
waiting, Mrs. Kaufman, to bust out, until--till things got riper. I know
with a woman like you, whose own happiness always is last, that first your
girl must be fixed--."

"She's a young girl, Mr. Vetsburg. You--you mustn't depend--. If I had my
say--."

"He's a fine fellow, Mrs. Kaufman. With his uncle to help 'em, they got,
let me tell you, a better start as most young ones!"

She rose, holding on to the desk.

"I--I--" she said. "What?"

"Lena," he uttered, very softly.

"Lena, Mr. Vetsburg?"

"It 'ain't been easy, Lenie, these years while she was only growing up, to
keep off my lips that name. A name just like a leaf off a rose. Lena!" he
reiterated and advanced.

Comprehension came quietly and dawning like a morning.

"I--I--. Mr. Vetsburg, you must excuse me," she said, and sat down
suddenly.

He crossed to the little desk and bent low over her chair, his hand not on
her shoulder, but at the knob of her chair. His voice had a swift rehearsed
quality.

"Maybe to-morrow, if you didn't back out, it would sound finer by the
ocean, Lenie, but it don't need the ocean a man should tell a woman when
she's the first and the finest woman in the world. Does it, Lenie?"

"I--I thought Ruby. She--"

"He's a good boy, Leo is, Lenie. A good boy what can be good to a woman
like his father before him. Good enough even for a fine girl like our Ruby,
Lenie--_our_ Ruby!"

"_Gott im Himmel_! then yo