noon
There were all of fifty dollars worth of roses . It gave her breath of a world of money that she had never known . Daily she saw the name of his banking and brokerage firm advertised in the papers . Once she met him in Merrill 's store at noon , and he invited her to lunch ; but she felt obliged to decline . Always he looked at her with such straight , vigorous eyes . To think that her beauty had done or was doing this ! Her mind , quite beyond herself , ran forward to an hour when perhaps this eager , magnetic man would take charge of her in a way never dreamed of by Harold .