"Mrs. Dillingham," he said, "I have been waiting to hear something about your pauper _protégé_, and I have come to-night to find out what you know about him and his father."
"If I knew of anything that would be of real advantage to you, I would tell you, but I do not," she replied.
"Well, that's an old story. Tell that to the marines. I'm sick of it."
"I prefer to judge for myself, if it's all the same to you," pursued the proprietor. "You've had the boy in your hands for months, and you know him, through and through, or else you are not the woman I have taken you for."
"Nothing offensive. Don't roll up your pretty eyes in that way."
"Please don't address me in that way again," she said.
"Well, what the devil have you to do with the boy any way, if you are not at work for me? That's what I'd like to know."
"I don't see how that helps me," responded Mr. Belcher.
"Yes, it is," with an emphatic nod of the head.
"Perhaps you think that will go down with me. Perhaps you are not acquainted with my way of doing business."
"Are you doing business with me, Mr. Belcher? Am I a partner of yours? If I am, perhaps you will be kind enough to tell me--business-like enough to tell me--why you wish me to worm secrets out of this boy."
"No, I will not. I trust no woman with my affairs. I keep my own councils."
"Mrs. Dillingham, you and I are friends--destined, I trust, to be better friends--closer friends--than we have ever been. This boy is of no consequence to you, and you cannot afford to sacrifice a man who can serve you more than you seem to know, for him."
"Well," said the lady, "there is no use in acting under a mask any longer. I would not betray the confidence of a child to serve any man I ever saw. You have been kind to me, but you have not trusted me. The lad loves me, and trusts me, and I will never betray him. What I tell you is true. I have learned nothing from him that can be of any genuine advantage to you. That is all the answer you will ever get from me. If you choose to throw away our friendship, you can take the responsibility," and Mrs. Dillingham hid her face in her handkerchief.
Mr. Belcher had been trying an experiment, and he had not succeeded--could not succeed; and there sat the beautiful, magnanimous woman before him, her heart torn as he believed with love for him, yet loyal to her ideas of honor as they related to a confiding child! How beautiful she was! Vexed he certainly was, but there was a balm for his vexation in these charming revelations of her character.