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to wait until he actually had it as his own, in which case it would be a different matter. Then he
could talk as a capitalist. He began to dream of a city-wide street-railway system controlled by a
few men, or preferably himself alone.
Chapter XVII
The days that had been passing brought Frank Cowperwood and Aileen Butler somewhat
closer together in spirit. Because of the pressure of his growing affairs he had not paid so much
attention to her as he might have, but he had seen her often this past year. She was now
nineteen and had grown into some subtle thoughts of her own. For one thing, she was
beginning to see the difference between good taste and bad taste in houses and furnishings.
"Papa, why do we stay in this old barn?" she asked her father one evening at dinner, when the
usual family group was seated at the table.
"What's the matter with this house, I'd like to know?" demanded Butler, who was drawn up close
to the table, his napkin tucked comfortably under his chin, for he insisted on this when company
was not present. "I don't see anything the matter with this house. Your mother and I manage to
live in it well enough."
"Oh, it's terrible, papa. You know it," supplemented Norah, who was seventeen and quite as
bright as her sister, though a little less experienced. "Everybody says so. Look at all the nice
houses that are being built everywhere about here."
"Everybody! Everybody! Who is 'everybody,' I'd like to know?" demanded Butler, with the
faintest touch of choler and much humor. "I'm somebody, and I like it. Those that don't like it
don't have to live in it. Who are they? What's the matter with it, I'd like to know?"
The question in just this form had been up a number of times before, and had been handled in
just this manner, or passed over entirely with a healthy Irish grin. To-night, however, it was
destined for a little more extended thought.
"You know it's bad, papa," corrected Aileen, firmly. "Now what's the use getting mad about it?
It's old and cheap and dingy. The furniture is all worn out. That old piano in there ought to be
given away. I won't play on it any more. The Cowperwoods--"
"Old is it!" exclaimed Butler, his accent sharpening somewhat with his self-induced rage. He
almost pronounced it "owled." "Dingy, hi! Where do you get that? At your convent, I suppose.
And where is it worn? Show me where it's worn."
He was coming to her reference to Cowperwood, but he hadn't reached that when Mrs. Butler
interfered. She was a stout, broad-faced woman, smiling-mouthed most of the time, with blurry,
gray Irish eyes, and a touch of red in her hair, now modified by grayness. Her cheek, below the
mouth, on the left side, was sharply accented by a large wen.
"Children! children!" (Mr. Butler, for all his commercial and political responsibility, was as much a
child to her as any.) "Youse mustn't quarrel now. Come now. Give your father the tomatoes."
There was an Irish maid serving at table; but plates were passed from one to the other just the
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