Wanted--A Match Maker | Page 2

for her not marrying. However

much men may admire her, they--they--Well, it's your kittenish,
cuddling kind of a girl they marry."
"No; you are entirely wrong. Doubtless it is her money, but Constance
has had plenty of admirers, and if she were less self--if she considered
the interests of the family--she would have married years ago. But she
is wholly blind to her duty, and checks or rebuffs every man who
attempts to show her devotion. And just because others take their
places, she is puffed up into the belief that she is to go through life with
an everlasting train of would-be suitors, and so enjoys her own triumph,
with never a thought of my girls."
"Why not ask her father to speak to her?"
"My dear! As if I hadn't, a dozen times at the least,"
"And what does he say?"
"That Constance shows her sense by not caring for the men I invite to
the house! As if I could help it! Of course with three girls in the house
one must cultivate dancing-men, and it's very unfair to blame me if
they aren't all one could wish."
"I thought Constance gave up going to dances last winter?"
"She did, but still I must ask them to my dinners, for if I don't they
won't show Muriel and Doris attention. Mr. Durant should realise that I
only do it for their sakes; yet to listen to him you'd suppose it was my
duty to close my doors to dancing-men, and spend my time seeking out
the kind one never hears of--who certainly don't know how to dance,
and who would either not talk at my dinners, or would lecture upon one
subject to the whole table--just because they are what he calls
'purposeful men.'"
"He probably recognises that the society man is not a marrying species,
while the other is."
"But there are several who would marry Constance in a minute if she'd

only give any one of them the smallest encouragement; and that's what
I mean when I complain of her being so unimpressionable. Muriel and
Doris like our set of men well enough, and I don't see what right she
has to be so over-particular."
Mrs. Ferguson rose and began the adjustment of her wrap, while saying,
"It seems to me there is but one thing for you to do, Anne."
"What?" eagerly questioned Mrs. Durant.
"Indulge in a little judicious matchmaking," suggested the friend, as she
held out her hand.
"It's utterly useless, Josie. I've tried again and again, and every time
have only done harm."
"How?"
"She won't--she is so suspicious. Now, last winter, Weston Curtis was
sending her flowers and--and, oh, all that sort of thing, and so I invited
him to dinner several times, and always put him next Constance, and
tried to help him in other ways, until she--well, what do you think that
girl did?"
Mrs. Ferguson's interest led her to drop her outstretched hand.
"Requested you not to?" she asked.
"Not one word did she have the grace to say to me, Josie, but she wrote
to him, and asked him not to send her any more flowers! Just think of
it."
"Then that's why he went to India."
"Yes. Of course if she had come and told me she didn't care for him, I
never would have kept on inviting him; but she is so secretive it is
impossible to tell what she is thinking about. I never dreamed that she
was conscious that I was trying to--to help her; and I have always been
so discreet that I think she never would have been if Mr. Durant hadn't

begun to joke about it. Only guess, darling, what he said to me once
right before her, just as I thought I was getting her interested in young
Schenck!"
"I can't imagine."
"Oh, it was some of his Wall Street talk about promoters of trusts
always securing options on the properties to be taken in, before
attempting a consolidation, or something of that sort. I shouldn't have
known what he meant if the boys hadn't laughed and looked at
Constance. And then Jack made matters worse by saying that my
interest would be satisfied with common stock, but Constance would
only accept preferred for hers. Men do blurt things out so--and yet they
assert that we women haven't tongue discretion. No, dear, with them
about it's perfectly useless for me to do so much as lift a finger to marry
Constance off, let alone her own naturally distrustful nature."
"Well, then, can't you get some one to do it for you--some friend of
hers?"
"I don't believe there is a person in the world who could influence
Constance as regards marriage," moaned Mrs. Durant. "Don't think that
I want to sacrifice