Mr. and Mrs. Second-Richest

SEATTLE — Microsoft Corp.’s billionaire Chairman Bill Gates reportedly will marry fiancee Melinda French today on the Hawaiian island of Lanai.

Among the guests will be investor Warren Buffett, the only man in America richer than Gates. The Microsoft co-founder is worth an estimated $7 billion.

Microsoft competitors have expressed hope that the sultan of software will slow his pace to spend time with his wife. But Gates told a reporter that marriage will give him more time for work by eliminating the distractions of dating.

Gates, 38, met French, in her late 20s, shortly after she joined Microsoft in 1987. Soon after their engagement was announced in March, the electronic mail was flying. Asked one message: “But does she do Windows?”