eople, and so they are willing to go out of their way to
oblige us. And we have commissions of all sorts coming to us, so it's
never any question of cash."

"Oh!" exclaimed the other, opening his eyes, "I see! Is that the way
you make money?"

"It's one of the ways we save it," said Oliver. "It comes to the same
thing."

"Do people know it?"

"Why, of course. Why not?"

"I don't know," said Montague. "It sounds a little queer."

"Nothing of the kind," said Oliver. "Some of the best people in New
York do it. Strangers come to the city, and they want to go to the
right places, and they ask me, and I send them. Or take Robbie Walling,
who keeps up five or six establishments, and spends several millions a
year. He can't see to it all personally--if he did, he'd never do
anything else. Why shouldn't he ask a friend to attend to things for
him? Or again, a new shop opens, and they want Mrs. Walling's trade for
the sake of the advertising, and they offer her a discount and me a
commission. Why shouldn't I get her to try them?"

"It's quite intricate," commented the other. "The stores have more than
one price, then?"

"They have as many prices as they have customers," was the answer. "Why
shouldn't they? New York is full of raw rich people who value things by
what they pay. And why shouldn't they pay high and be happy? That
opera-cloak that Alice has--Reval promised it to me for two thousand,
and I'll wager you she'd charge some woman from Butte, Montana,
thirty-five hundred for one just like it."

Montague got up suddenly. "Stop," he said, waving his hands. "You take
all the bloom off the butterfly's wings!"

He asked where they were going that evening, and Oliver said that they
were invited to an informal dinner-party at Mrs. Winnie Duval's. Mrs.
Winnie was the young widow who had recently married the founder of the
great banking-house of Puval and Co.--so Oliver explained; she was a
chum of his, and they would meet an interesting set there. She was
going to invite her cousin, Charlie Carter--she wanted him to meet
Alice. "Mrs. Winnie's always plotting to get Charlie to settle down,"
said Oliver, with a merry laugh.

He telephoned for his man to bring over his clothes, and he and his
brother dressed. Then Alice came in, looking like the goddess of the
dawn in the gorgeous rose-coloured gown. The colour in her cheeks was
even brighter than usual; for she was staggered to find how low the
gown was cut, and was af