Josephine took a deep breath and climbed to her feet. Whiteway opened his arms to embrace her.

“THEN WHAT HAPPENED?” whispered Marion when Bell reported to her at breakfast in the Josephine Special’s lavish dining car. Her enormous coral-sea green eyes were wide and so beautiful that for a long moment Bell lost his train of thought.

“Did she say yes?” Marion prompted.

“No.”

“Good. Preston is too in love with himself to be a loving husband. If she’s as sweet a girl as I read in the newspapers, she deserves better.”

“You’ve seen more of her than the newspaper readers.”

“We’ve only said hello in passing. But I would have thought she would have answered ‘Maybe.’”

“Why?” Bell asked.

Marion thought on that. “She strikes me as someone who gets what she wants.”

“It was a sort-of maybe. She said she had to think about it.”

“I suspect she has no one to talk to. I’ll give her an ear. And an opinion, if she wants one.”

“I was hoping you would say that,” said Bell. “In fact, I was hoping you would put your mind to what Harry Frost meant when he said that she and Celere were up to something.”

Marion glanced out the window. A stiff wind was spinning miniature tornadoes of coal smoke, wheat chaff, and cinders around the trains. “No flying today. I will do it right now.”

“I WANT TO BE LIKE YOU WHEN I GROW UP,” Josephine grinned at Marion. They were alone in the front parlor of Josephine’s private car, curled up in facing armchairs. Coffee cups sat between them untouched.

“I hope I don’t seem that old. Besides, you are grown up. You’re driving a flying machine across the continent.”

“That’s not the same. I want to be a straight shooter like you.”

“What do you mean?”

“You told me straight off that Isaac overheard Preston asking me to marry him.”

Marion said, “I also told you that I’m very curious what you think of his proposal.”

“I don’t know. I mean, what does he want to marry me for?” She gave Marion one of her big open grins. “I’m just a silly girl two seconds off the farm.”

“Men are strange creatures,” Marion smiled back. “Most of them. Maybe he loves you.”

“He didn’t say he loved me.”

“Well, Preston is not very bright in many ways. On the other hand, he is handsome.”

“I suppose.”

“And very, very wealthy.”

“So was Harry.”

“Unlike Harry, Preston, for all his many, many faults, is no brute.”

“Yes, but he’s big like Harry.”

“And getting bigger,” laughed Marion. “If he isn’t careful, he’ll end up like President Taft.”

“Or Steve Stevens.”

They both laughed. Marion watched her closely, and asked, “Are you considering it at all?”