To-night, however, he was quite sincere. His visit to Los Angeles had been
a success; he had actually put through a deal that had translated itself
into a cheque for a thousand dollars. He had, through a mistaken order,
been overstocked with a certain commodity from the Orient that the retail
merchants of San Francisco bought very sparingly; but he had found in
Los Angeles a firm that did a large business with the swarming Japanese
population and was glad to take it over at a reasonable figure.
II
It was after dinner; his taut trim body was relaxed in evening luxury
before the wood fire of the back parlor, and he was half way through a
cigar when Alexina rose and extended one arm along the mantelpiece. She
looked like a long black poplar with her round narrow flexible figure and
her small head held with a lofty poise; as serene as a poplar in France on
a balmy day. But she quaked inside.
She glanced at her happy unsuspecting husband with an engaging smile. "I'm
afraid you will be rather cross with me," she said softly. "But I went down
to the City Hall yesterday and revoked my power of attorney to you."
"You did what?" The slow blood rose to Dwight's hair. He mechanically took
the cigar from his mouth. It lost its flavor. He had a sensation of falling
through space...out of somewhere....
Alexina repeated her statement.
He recovered himself. "Tom Abbott has been at you again, I suppose.
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