gs that he had seen, Montague had come to realize that the Robbie
Wallings, with all their wealth and power and grandeur, were actually
quite stingy. While all the world saw them scattering fortunes in their
pathway, in reality they were keeping track of every dollar. And Robbie
himself was liable to panic fits of economy, in which he went to the
most absurd excesses--Montague once heard him haggling over fifty cents
with a cabman. Lavish hosts though they both were, it was the literal
truth that they never spent money upon anyone but themselves--the end
and aim of their every action was the power and prestige of the Robbie
Wallings.

"They do it because they are friends of mine," said Oliver, and
evidently wished that to satisfy his brother. But it only shifted the
problem and set him to watching Robbie and Oliver, and trying to make
out the basis of their relationship. There was a very grave question
concerned in this. Oliver had come to New York comparatively poor, and
now he was rich--or, at any rate, he lived like a rich man. And his
brother, whose scent was growing keener with every day of his stay in
New York, had about made up his mind that Oliver got his money from
Robbie Walling.

Here, again, the problem would have been simple, if it had been another
person than Robbie; Montague would have concluded that his brother was
a "hanger-on." There were many great families whose establishments were
infested with such parasites. Siegfried Harvey, for instance, was a man
who had always half a dozen young chaps hanging about him; good-looking
and lively fellows, who hunted and played bridge, and amused the
married women while their husbands were at work, and who, if ever they
dropped a hint that they were hard up, might be reasonably certain of
being offered a cheque. But if the Robbie Wallings were to write
cheques, it must be for value received. And what could the value be?

"Ollie" was rather a little god among the ultra-swagger; his taste was
a kind of inspiration. And yet his brother noticed that in such
questions he always deferred instantly to the Wallings; and surely the
Wallings were not people to be persuaded that they needed anyone to
guide them in matters of taste. Again, Ollie was the very devil of a
wit, and people were heartily afraid of him; and Montague had noticed
that he never by any chance made fun of Robbie--that the fetiches of
the house of Walling were always treated with respect. So he had
won