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Show Suitors of & J5Y KENNETT n MELISSA WOULD NOT TOLERATE A TIGHTWAD. Mrs. Merriwid picked her pearl .ear studs from her dressing table and contemplated con-templated them thoughtfully as they lav. In her rosy palm. "I wonder if they would really dissolve in vinegar," she murmured, " and what effect they would have on a person's tummy in that form. I've a great mind to try it." Her maternal maiden aunt Jane, who was buttoning her down the back, asked heq what in the land she was talking about. "You are getting real fleshy, Melissa," she added, as Bhe hooked the girdle with some slight dif-5culty. dif-5culty. "Do you know It?" "No, dearie," replied Mrs. Merriwid, "and I don't want to know it, if you don't mind. They say vinegar emaciates emaci-ates one," she continued reflectively, "but I wasn't thinking of that. I was wondering if Mr. Stintwell wouldn't fall dead if I took that sort df a Cleopatra cocktail in his presence. If he knew they were worth two hundred hun-dred and fifty dollars, I'm pretty certain cer-tain he would. But then, I'd have to bother with the coroner and I haven't got a decent picture of myself that I could give the newspaper reporters, so I'll compromise by telling him that he's wasting his breath. He doesn't like to waste anything, bo that ought to stop him." Aunt Jane made a clucking sound Indicative of Impatience. "If you refuse re-fuse Mr. Stintwell, you're a very foolish fool-ish woman. That's all I've got to i pffel! til (Hfr "If He Ate a Light Breakfast, He'd Expect a Rebate." say," she remarked. "He must be worth over a million dollars." "Have you ever noticed how short he keeps his finger nails, auntie?" Mrs. Merriwid asked. "That's to prevent pre-vent them running into the palms of his hands. He's so close fisted he has to. What would it profit me to marry a case of chronic grip like that, sweetheart? sweet-heart? If he is worth a million, which don't doubt in the least, you can rest assured that he'll never be rated at nine hundred and ninety-nine thousand, thous-and, nine hundred and ninety-nine on account of his wife's extravagance. When he repeats that little clause in the marriage service about endowing the blushing bride with all his worldly world-ly goods, he'll have his fingers crossed. cross-ed. No, beloved, if I were to marry or mercenary considerations, I'd pick a horny-headed structural Iron worker, work-er, with a good-sized life and accident policy, who'd turn over his weekly pay check to me every Saturday night, and leave the question of beer money to my sense of Justice. Mr'. Stintwell has been looking out for the main chance so long and hard that he's suffering suf-fering severely from eye strain. Did you know he had Invited me to go with him to see the sub-treasury ?" "I should think that would be very Interesting," said Aunt Jane. "Extremely so," agreed Mrs. Merriwid, Merri-wid, sarcastically. "I suppose they let you feast your delighted eyes on bars of gold bullion and let you hold a million-dollar bill in each hand. That would be almost as satisfactory as gloating over your husband's rating in Bradstreet just after he's emitted a stentorian roar because somebody has left the light switched on in the bathroom. bath-room. But he means kindly, and I think he Intends to pay my carfare both ways. Only I'm not going." . "You will have your own way of course, my dear," said Aunt Jane, "but it seems to me that If a gentleman pays a lady marked attention with the obvious design of matrimony, and is so wealthy as to be above suspicion of any mercenary motive, the object, of his admiration might be reasonably assured of liberal treatment." "It depends on the gentleman who Is paying the marked attention, dearie," replied Mrs. 'Merriwid. "If the gentleman gentle-man Is not a liberal gentleman and the. lady has to employ a pneumatic drill and a stick of dynamite to jar a nickle loose enough to wrench away from him, you have another seem coming. I'm strictly In favor of providing pro-viding for a rainy day, auntie, but I think if one has an umbrella and raincoat rain-coat and rubbers in the hall closet, on may feel reasonably assured. I don't believe in going around In a scanty bathing suit all the time in anticipation an-ticipation of a flood. I'm told that Mr. Stintwell tries to get a cash discount dis-count when he buys a postage stamp, but that may be exaggerated. He might try to get a little concession if he bought five dollars' worth in a lump, however." "Do you really think that he is attracted at-tracted by your money, Melissa?" asked Aunt Jane. "He isn't repelled," Mrs. Merriwid answered. "I think he imagines my bonds might be a bond of sympathy between us, but he Intends to be fair. His Idea is a partnership. He'd be willing to take me in on the ground floor, as It were, and when we drew up our chairs to go over our accounts in the evening, he wouldn't charge me up with anything that wasn't right. If he ate a light breaKlast, he'd probably prob-ably expect a rebate, and he'd want me to debit myself with the sugar I used for making fudge, which wouldn't be more than just; but he'd be willing to bear a proper proportion of the household expenses, if you left It to him what a proper proportion was. Well, that isn't what I want, exactly, dearie. I want to feel at liberty to sign up with the agent of a patent washing machine, if I need one, without with-out having to dispose of my electric brougham to meet the instanents. There's a current impression that Mr. Stintwell has feathered his nest, but I don't take any stock in that. He'd take his feathers to the nearest pillow factory and get the highest market price for them every time, dearie. But I know there's much In me personally that he admires." "What, for instance?" inquired Aunt Jane. Mrs. Merriwid thought for a moment. mo-ment. "Well, there's my golden hair," she replied, "and my silvery laughter and my sterling sense, not to speak of my pearly teeth and ruby lips. My voice has rich tones, you know, and I have a large fund of humor and capital cap-ital spirits, and you were just saying that I had an affluent figure." "You're quite a treasure," said Aunt Jane. "All of that," replied her niece, serenely. se-renely. "But I can tell you I'm not going go-ing to be buried by a man who is congenitally unable to dig up." (Copyright, 1913, by W. G. Chapman.) |