Page:Arthur Stringer - Twin Tales.djvu/113

Rh "That assault was condoned, and, I am given to understand, was personally instigated and abetted by you, Miss Hayden," continued the enemy. "Mr. Uhlan is not only a gentleman of high social and professional standing, but is to-day one of the best-paid portrait-painters in America. Through the injuries which he sustained in this assault, I find, he is unable to execute a commission for the portrait of one of Pittsburgh's most prominent millionaires, before the latter sails for Europe. And through that, I regret to inform you, he has sustained a direct loss of exactly twelve thousand dollars." A tempered sigh of relief escaped Teddie. She had expected something much worse, something much more difficult of adjustment.

"Well, if that's all that's worrying him," she remarked, "I'll be quite willing to make his loss good to him."

The aged attorney, as he sat massaging his bony knuckles, saw that the picking was good. So he could afford to become fatherly again.