lisable property."

"I am afraid, though, your dad would hardly listen to me. He would put
any advice I might give him down to gratuitous impertinence and
cubbish presumption."

Eileen sighed again.

"Don't you worry though, dearie! If the opportunity turns up I will
speak my mind."

As they ran in at the gateway and up through the avenue of trees, they
found John Royce Pederstone seated in a garden chair on the front
lawn.

The old man's greeting to his daughter and to Phil was cordiality
itself, for John Royce Pederstone was always a cheerful man, believing
good of all whom he met, shutting his ears to all slander and quick to
recognise enterprise and ability.

"Well, young man!--you've been making rapid progress since I saw you
last," he remarked, by way of greeting.

"More ways than one," put in Eileen a little shyly.

Phil lost no time in stating his case in plain words to the
politician. And his very plain words were what struck the responsive
chords, for John Royce Pederstone was of all things a plain man. And
the great pity of it all was that he had not stayed with plain
blacksmithing or plain ranching.

So many men find out after the act that they have left the substance
to chase the shadow.

John Royce Pederstone, however, had not yet come to the point of
recognising this very great truth.

"What does my Eileen say to all this?" he asked, by way of answer.

"Eileen says, 'Ugh-huh!' daddy," she put in roguishly.

Royce Pederstone held out his hand and gripped Phil's, with a slightly
tired smile.

"If my Eileen says, 'Ugh-huh!' my son, then 'Ugh-huh!' it is."

Eileen threw her arms round her father's neck and hugged him.

"I don't know anything much about you, Ralston, but your record is
clean since you came here--despite some attempts to blacken it. I like
your face--and if you can make my motherless girl happy when I'm gone,
you'll have an old man's blessing.

"If you don't, though" (his blue eyes flashed temporary fire), "God
help you! There have been more than one who wanted my Eileen, but I
have told all of them that the choice of a man must be Eileen's.

"By the way, Phil,--is it true what they say,--that the Langford-Ralston
Company buy and sell for everybody but themselves?"

"Yes,--quite true!" answered Phil.

The old man laughed. "Doesn't seem much like being very fond of their
own cooking, Eileen."

"One doesn't have to eat what he cooks, daddy,--and somebody's got to
cook