rofessor announced. "I myself shall telephone to see if
Elizabeth has returned. If she is still away, I shall spend an hour or
two, I think, with my friends at the Blue Room Club. Beatrice, this has
been a joy to me, a joy soon, I hope, to be repeated."

He took both her hands. She smiled at him with an attempt at
cheerfulness.

"Good-night, father!" she said.

"And to you, sir, also, good-night!" the professor added, taking
Tavernake's hand and holding it for a minute in his, while he looked
impressively in his face. "I will not say too much, but I will say this:
so much as I have seen of you, I like. Good-night!"

He turned and strode away. Both Beatrice and Tavernake watched him until
he disappeared. Then, with a sigh, she picked up her skirts with her
right hand, and took Tavernake's arm.

"Do you mind walking home?" she asked. "My head aches."

Tavernake looked for a moment wistfully across the road toward the Milan
Court. Beatrice's hand, however, only held his arm the tighter.

"I am going to make you come with me every step of the way," she
declared, "so you can just as well make the best of it. Afterwards--"

"What about afterwards?" he interrupted.

"Afterwards," she continued, with decision, "you are to go straight
home!"

CHAPTER XXI. SOME EXCELLENT ADVICE

Tavernake, in response to a somewhat urgent message, walked into his
solicitor's office almost as soon as they opened on the following
morning. The junior partner of the firm, who took an interest in him,
and was anxious, indeed, to invest a small amount in the Marston Rise
Building Company, received him cordially but with some concern.

"Look here, Tavernake," he said, "I thought I'd better write a line and
ask you to come down. You haven't forgotten, have you, that our option
of purchase lasts only three days longer?"

Tavernake nodded.

"Well, what of it?" he asked.

"It's just as well that you should understand the situation," the lawyer
continued. "Your old people are hard upon our heels in this matter,
and there will be no chance of any extension--not even for an hour. Mr.
Dowling has already put in an offer a thousand pounds better than yours;
I heard that incidentally yesterday afternoon; so you may be sure
that the second your option has legally expired, the thing will be off
altogether so far as you're concerned."

"That's all very well," Tavernake remarked, "but what about the plots
that already belong to me?"

"Th