Bensonians (of the A.C. pattern) will
certainly be glad to have what must surely have been their suspicions
confirmed, and to admit _Father Payne_ to the shelves of authenticity.
* * * * *
Miss DOROTHEA CONYERS has long ere this established herself as a specialist
of repute in Irish sporting tales. You will need but one look at the
picture wrapper of _The Financing of Fiona_ (ALLEN) to see that a
repetition of the same agreeable mixture awaits you within. _Fiona_ was a
charming young woman (Irish, of course) with a rich uncle and a poor, very
unattractive cousin, who loved her for her expectations. As _Fiona_ had no
conception about money beyond the spending of it, the uncle made a will,
whose object was that she should have plenty. The suitor, however, knowing
of this, and being a naughty, rather improbable person, destroyed part of
it, with the result that _Fiona_ was apparently left only the ancestral
home and no cash to keep it up. So she was forced to take in gentleman
boarders for the hunting, and (for propriety's sake) to invent a mythical
chaperon, who lived above stairs. And, after all, she needn't have done any
such thing, because the rich uncle, in leaving her all the contents of the
mansion, had foolishly forgotten to mention a secret drawer full of
Canadian securities. As for the villain, I really hardly dare tell you the
impossibly silly way in which he allowed himself to be caught out. But of
course all this melodrama is not what matters.
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