"General Prentice and his wife. Do you
know of them?"

"I have heard Mr. Ryder speak of Prentice
the banker. Is that the one you mean?"

"Yes," said Montague, — "the president of
the Trust Company of the Republic. He was
an old comrade of my father's, and they were the
first people I met here in New York. I have
got to know them very well since. I told them I
would bring you up to dinner sometime, and I
will telephone them, if you say so. I don't
think it's a good idea for you to sit here by your-
self and think about Dan Waterman."

"Oh, I don't mind it now," said Lucy. "But
I will go with you, if you like."

They went to the Prentices'. There were the
General himself, and Mrs. Prentice, and their
two daughters, one of whom was a student in
college, and the other a violinist of considerable
talent. General Prentice was now over seventy,
and his beard was snow-white, but he still had



THE MONEYCHANGERS 79

the erect carriage and the commanding presence
of a soldier. Mrs. Prentice Montague had
first met one evening when he had been their
guest at the opera, and she had impressed him
as a lady with a great many diamonds, who
talked to him about other people while he was
trying to listen to the music. But she was, as
Lucy phrased it afterwards, "a motherly soul,
when one got underneath her war-paint.'' She
was always inviting Montague to her home and
introducing him to people whom she thought
would be of assistance to him.
