Homer must of been kind of swept off his feet at that very moment, and the rapids just below him. I guess he'd already been made mushy sentimental by seeing the ideal romantic marriage between Uncle Henry and his wife—forty years or so together and still able to set down in peace and quiet without having something squirm over you to see what you had in your pockets or ask what made your hair come out that funny way, till you wished a couple she-bears would rush out and devour forty-two of 'em.

It was the first of quite many evenings when Homer and the lady would set with a dish of apples and fried cakes between 'em and denounce the world's posterity. The lady was even suffering grave doubts about marriage. She said having to make her own way after she lost her husband had made her relish her independence too much to think of ever giving it up again lightly. Of course she wouldn't say that possibly at some time in the dim future a congenial mate that thought as she did on vital topics—and so forth—just enough to give Homer a feeling of security that was wholly unwarranted. Wasn't he the heedless Hugo?

He was quite wordy about the lady to me when he come over on an errand one day. He told me all about these delightful talks of theirs, and what an attractive person she was, sound as a nut, and companionable and good-looking without being one of these painted dolls. He said, to see her above her sewing, she was a lovely view that he never tired of gazing at, and to hear her loathe children was music to the ear. He said she was a rare woman. I said she must be and asked him if he had committed himself.

"Well, I don't say I have and I don't say I haven't," he says; "but here I be, standing with reluctant feet at the parting of the ways. And who knows what might happen? I know I've had some darned close shaves from doing a whole lot worse in my time."

So I wished him the best of luck with this lady child hater; not that I thought he'd really get what was coming to him. He was so crafty. He was one of them that love not well but too wisely, as the saying is. Still, there was a chance. He was scared to death of fire and yet he would keep on playing with it. Some day the merry old flames might lick him up. I hoped for the best.

A few days after that I went down to the foreman's house late in the afternoon to see him about a shipment we had to make. Scott was off somewhere, but his sister was in; so I set talking with her, and waiting. This here Minna Humphrey was a hectic, blighted girl of thirty, sandy-haired, green-eyed, and little—no bigger than a bar of soap after a day's washing. What had blighted the poor thing was having to teach public school for a dozen years. She'd been teaching down to Kulanche that year and had just closed up. We set out in front of the house and Minna told me she was all in; and how she'd ever got through the season she didn't know.

She went on to speak of little children. Fire in her voice? Murder! According to Minna, children had ought to be put in cages soon as they can walk and kept there till they are grown; fed through the bars and shot down if they break out. That's what twelve years' enforced contact with 'em had done to Minna's finer instincts. She said absolutely nothing in the world could be so repugnant to her as a roomful of the little animals writing on slates with squeaky pencils. She said other things about 'em that done her no credit.

And while I listened painfully who should be riding up but Homer Gale!

"Here," I says to Minna; "here's a man you'll be a joyous treat to; just let him come in and listen to your song a while. Begin at the beginning and say it all slow, and let Homer have some happy moments."

So I introduced the two, and after a few formalities was got over I had Minna telling in a heartfelt manner what teaching a public school was like, and what a tortured life she led among creatures that should never be treated as human. Homer listened with glistening eyes that got quite moist at the last. Minna went on to say that children's mothers was almost as bad, raging in to pick a fuss with her every time a child had been disciplined for some piece of deviltry. She said mothers give her pretty near as much trouble as the kids themselves.

It was a joyous and painful narrative to Homer. He said why didn't Minna take up something else? And Minna said she was going to. She'd been working two summers in Judge Ballard's office, down to Red Gap, and was going to again this summer, soon as she regained a little vitality; and she hoped now she'd have a steady job there and never have to go back to the old life of degradation. Homer sympathized warmly; his heart had really been touched. He hoped she'd rise out of the depths to something tolerable; and then he told her about Bert's five horrible children that drove him out into the brush—and so forth.

I listened in a while; and then I says to Homer ain't it nice for him to meet someone else that thinks as he does on this great vital topic, Minna seeming to find young ones as repulsive as Mrs. Judson Tolliver? And how about that lady anyway? And how is his affair coming on? I never dreamed of starting anything. I was being friendly.

Homer gets vivacious and smirks something horrible, and says, well, he don't see why people make a secret of such things; and the fact is that that lady and him have about decided that Fate has flung 'em together for a lofty purpose. Of course nothing was settled definite yet—no dates nor anything; but probably before long there'd be a nice little home adorning a certain place he'd kept his eye on, and someone there keeping a light in the window for him—and so on. It sounded almost too good to be true that this old shellback had been harpooned at last.

Then Minna spoke up, when Homer had babbled to a finish, and smirked and looked highly offensive. She says brightly:

"Oh, yes; Mrs. Judson Tolliver. I know her well; and I'm sure, Mr. Gale, I wish you all the happiness in the world with the woman of your choice. She's a very sterling character indeed—and such a good mother!"

"How's that?" says Homer. "I didn't hear you just right. Such a good what?"

"I said she's such a good mother," Minna answers him.

Homer's smirk kind of froze on his face.

"Mother to what?" he says in a low, passionate tone, like an actor.

"Mother to her three little ones," says Minna. Then she says again quick: "Why, what's the matter, Mr. Gale?" For Homer seemed to have been took bad.

"Great Godfrey!" he says, hardly able to get his voice.

"And, of course, you won't mind my saying it," Minna goes on, "because you seem so broad-minded about children, but when I taught primary in Red Gap last year those three little boys of hers gave me more trouble than any other two dozen of the pests in the whole room."

Homer couldn't say anything this time. He looked like a doctor was knifing him without anesthetics.

"And to make it worse," says Minna, "the mother is so crazy about them, and so sensitive about any little thing done to them in the way of discipline—really, she has very little control of her language where those children are concerned. Still, of course, that's how any good mother will act, to be sure; and especially when they have no father.

"I'm glad indeed the poor woman is to have someone like you that will take the responsibility off her shoulders, because those boys are now at an age where discipline counts. Of course she'll expect you to be gentle with them, even though firm. Oswald—he's eleven now, I believe—will soon be old enough to send to reform school; but the younger ones, seven and nine—My! such spirits as they have! They'll really need someone with strength."

Homer was looking as if this bright chatter would add twenty years to his age. He'd slumped down on the stoop, where he'd been setting, like he'd had a stroke.

"So she's that kind, is she?" he kind of mutters. "A good thing I found it out on her!"

"The children live with their grandmother in Red Gap while their mother is away," says Minna. "They really need a strong hand."

"Not mine!" says Homer. Then he got slowly up and staggered down a few steps toward the gate. "It's a good thing I found out this scandal on her in time," says he. "Talk about underhandedness! Talk about a woman hiding her guilty secret! Talk about infamy! I'll expose her, all right. I'm going straight to her and tell her I know all. I'll make her cower in shame!" He's out on his horse with his reckless threat.

"Now you've sunk the ship," I says to Minna. "I knew the woman was leading a double life as fur as Homer was concerned, but I wasn't going to let on to the poor zany. It's time he was speared, and this would of been a judgment on him that his best friends would of relished keenly. Lots of us was looking forward to the tragedy with great pleasure. You spoiled a lot of fun for the valley."

"But it would not have been right," says Minna. "It would truly have been the blackest of tragedies to a man of Mr. Gale's sensitive fibres. You can't enter into his feelings because you never taught primary. Also, I think he is very far from being a poor zany, as you have chosen to call him." The poor thing was warm and valiant when she finished this, looking like Joan of Arc or someone just before the battle.

And Homer never went back and made the lady cower like he said he meant to. Mebbe it occurred to him on the way that she was not one of them that cower easy. Mebbe he felt he was dealing with a desperate adventuress, as cunning as she was false-hearted. Anyway, he weakened like so many folks that start off brave to tell someone so-and-so right to their faces. He didn't go back at all till the middle of the night, when he pussyfooted in and got his things out, and disappeared like he had stumbled down a well.

Uncle Henry had to feed his own stock next morning, while Mrs. Tolliver took on in great alarm and wanted a posse formed to rescue Homer from wherever he was. Her first idea was that he had been kidnapped and was being held for ransom; but someway she couldn't get any one else very hearty about this notion. So then she said he had been murdered, or was lying off in the brush somewhere with a broken leg.

It was pointed out to her that Homer wouldn't be likely to come and collect all his things in the night in order to keep a date with an assassin, or even to have his leg broke. About the third day she guessed pretty close to the awful truth and spoke a few calm words about putting her case in the hands of some good lawyer.

The valley was interested. It looked like a chance for the laugh of the year. It looked like the lightnings of a just heaven had struck where they was long overdue. Then it was discovered that Homer was hiding out over in the hills with a man after coyotes with traps and poison. His job must of appealed to Homer's cynical nature at that moment—anything with traps and poison in it.

Dave Pickens was the man that found him, he not having much else to do. And he let Homer know the worst he could think of without mincing words. He said the deserted fiancee was going to bring suit against Homer for one hundred thousand dollars—that being the biggest sum Dave could think of—for breach of promise, and Homer might as well come out and face the music.

Homer did come out, bold as brass. He'd been afraid the lady might gun him or act violent with something; but if she wasn't threatening anything but legal violence he didn't care. He just couldn't conceive that a lady with three children could make a suit like that stick against any man—especially three children that was known to be hellions. He didn't even believe the lady would start a suit—not with the facts of her shame known far and wide. He was jaunty and defiant about this, and come right out of hiding and agreed to work for me again, Scott Humphrey having sent his wife and children on a visit to Grandma Humphrey.

But, lands. He didn't earn his salt. Friends and well-wishers took the jauntiness all out of him in no time. Parties rode from far and near to put him wise. Ranchers from ten miles up and down the creek would drop important work just to ride over and tell him harsh facts about the law, and how, as man to man, it looked dark indeed for him. These parties told him that the possession of three children by a lawful widow was not regarded as criminal by our best courts. It wasn't even considered shameful. And it was further pointed out by many of the same comforters that the children would really be a help to the lady in her suit, cinching the sympathy of a jury.

Also, they didn't neglect to tell him that probably half the jury would be women—wives and mothers. And what chance would he have with women when they was told how he regarded children? He spent a good half of the time I paid him for in listening to these friendly words. They give Homer an entirely new slant on our boasted civilization and lowered it a whole lot in his esteem.

About the only person in the whole valley that wasn't laughing at him and giving him false sympathy with a sting in its tail was Minna Humphrey. Homer told her all about the foul conspiracy against his fortune, and how his life would be blasted by marrying into a family with three outcasts like he'd been told these was. And what was our courts coming to if their records could be stained by blackmailers.

And Minna give him the honest sympathy of a woman who had taught school twelve years, loathed the sight of any human under twenty, and even considered that the institution of marriage had been greatly overpraised. Certainly she felt it was not for her; and she could understand Homer's wanting to escape. She and him would set out and discuss his chances long after he had ought to of been in bed if he was going to earn his pay.

Minna admitted that things looked dark for him on account of the insane prejudice that would be against him for his views on children. She said he couldn't expect anything like a fair trial where these was known even with a jury of his peers; and it was quite true that probably only five or six of the jury would be his peers, the rest being women.

Homer told me about these talks—out of working hours, you can bet! How Minna was the only person round that would stand by anyone in trouble; how she loathed kids, and even loathed the thought of human marriage.

"Minna is a nice girl," I told him; "but I should think you'd learn not to pay attention to a woman that talks about children that way. Remember this other lady talked the same way about 'em before the scandal come out."

But he was indignant that any one could suspect Minna's child hating wasn't honest.

"That little girl is pure as a prism!" he says. "When she says she hates 'em, she hates 'em. The other depraved creature was only working on my better nature."

"Well," I says, "the case does look black; but mebbe you could settle for a mere five thousand dollars."

"It wouldn't be a mere five thousand dollars," says Homer; "it would be the savings of a lifetime of honest toil and watching the pennies. That's all I got."

"Serves you right, then," I says, "for not having got married years ago and having little ones of your own about your knee!"

Homer shuddered painfully when I said this. He started to answer something back, but just choked up and couldn't.

The adventuress had, of course, sent letters and messages to Homer. The early ones had been pleading, but the last one wasn't. It was more in the nature of a base threat if closely analyzed. Then she finished up her sewing at the Mortimers' and departed for Red Gap, leaving a final announcement to anybody it concerned that she would now find out if there was any law in the land to protect a defenseless woman in her sacred right to motherhood.

Homer shivered when he heard it and begun to think of making another get-away, like he had done from Idaho. He thought more about it when someone come back from town and said she was really consulting a lawyer.

He'd of gone, I guess, if Minna hadn't kept cheering him up with sympathy and hating children with him. Homer was one desperate man, but still he couldn't tear himself away from Minna.

Then one morning he gets a letter from the Red Gap lawyer. It says his client, Mrs. Judson Tolliver, has directed him to bring suit against Homer for five thousand dollars; and would Homer mebbe like to save the additional cost—which would be heavy, of course—by settling the matter out of court and avoiding pain for all?

Homer was in a state where he almost fell for this offer. It was that or facing a jury that would have it in for him, anyway, or disappearing like he had done in Idaho; only this lady was highly determined, and reports had already come to him that he would be watched and nailed if he tried to leave. It would mean being hounded from pillar to post, even if he did get away. He went down and put it up to Minna, as I heard later.

"I'm a desperate man," he says, "being hounded by this here catamount; and mebbe it's best to give in."

"It's outrageous!" says Minna. "Of course you don't care about the money; but it's the principle of the thing."

"Well, yes and no," says Homer. "You might say I care some about the money. That's plain nature, and I never denied I was human."

So they went on to discuss it back and forth warmly, when a misunderstanding arose that I was very careful to get the rights of a couple of weeks later.

Minna went over the old ground that Homer could never get a fair trial; then she brightened up all at once and says:

"Don't you pay it. Don't you do it; because you won't have to if you do what I say."

Homer gets excited and says:

"Yes, yes; go on!"

And Minna goes on.

"When people can't get fair trials in a place," she says, "they always take change of venues."

"Change of venues?" says Homer, kind of uneasy, it seemed.

"Certainly," says Minna: "they take change of venues. I've worked in Judge Ballard's office long enough to know that much. Why didn't I think of it before? It's your one chance to escape this creature's snare."

"Change of venues?" says Homer again, kind of aghast.

"It's your only way out," says Minna; "and I'll do everything I can—"

"You will?" says Homer.

"Why, of course!" says Minna. "Any thing—"

"All right, then," says Homer. "You get your things on, and I'll saddle your horse and bring him round."

"What for?" demands Minna.

"I'm a desperate man!" says Homer. "You say it's the only way out, and you know the law; so come along to Kulanche with me." And he beat if off to the barn.

Well, Minna had said she'd do anything she could, thinking she'd write herself to Judge Ballard and find out all the details; but if Homer wanted her to go to Kulanche with him and try to start the thing there—why, all right. She was ready when Homer come with her horse and off they rode on the twelve-mile trip.

I gather that not much was said on the way by Homer who only muttered like a fever patient from time to time, with Minna saying once in a while how glad she was she had thought up this one sure way out of his trouble.

At Kulanche they rode up in front of Old Man Geiger's office, who is justice of the peace.

"Wait here a minute," says Homer, and went inside. Pretty soon he come out and got her. "Come on, now," he says, "I got it all fixed."

And Minna goes in, thinking mebbe she's got to swear to an affidavit or something that Homer couldn't get a fair trial among people knowing he regarded little ones as so many cockroaches or something to step on.

She got some shock when Homer took her inside and held her tight by the wrist while Old Man Geiger married 'em. That's about the way it was. She says she was so weak she could hardly stand up, and she hadn't hardly any voice at all left. But she kept on saying "Why, Homer!" and "Oh, Homer!" and "No, no, Homer!" as soon as she discovered that she had been dragged off to a fate she had always regarded as worse than death; but a lot of good it done her to say them things in a voice not much better than a whisper.

And the dreadful thing was over before she could get strength to say anything more powerful. There she was, married to a man she thought highly of, it's true, and had a great sympathy for in the foul wrong one of her sex had tried to slip over on him; but a man she had never thought of marrying. I'm telling you what she told me. And after sentence had been pronounced she kept on saying "Why, Homer!" and "Oh, Homer!" and "No, no, Homer!" till there was nothing to do but get some clothes out of her trunk that she'd left down there in time to take the narrow gauge for their wedding tour to Spokane.

The news spread over the valley next day like a brush fire in August. It was startling! Like the newspapers say of a suicide, "No cause could be assigned for the rash act." They was away ten days and come back to find the whole country was again giving Homer the laugh because Mrs. Tolliver had up and married a prosperous widower from over in Surprise Valley, and had never brought any suit against him. It was said that even the late Mrs. Tolliver was laughing heartily at him.

Homer didn't seem to care, and Minna certainly didn't. She was the old-fashioned kind of wife, a kind you don't hear much of nowadays; the kind that regards her husband as perfect, and looks up to him. She told me about the tumultuous wedding. Neither of 'em had had time for any talk till they got on the train. Then it come out. She says why ever did Homer do such a monstrous thing? And Homer says:

"Well, you told me a change of Venus was the only way out for me—"

"I said a change of venue," says Minna.

"It sounded like change of Venus," says Homer, "and I knew Venus was the god of love. And you said you was willing and I knew we was congenial, and I was a desperate man; and so here we are!"

So she cried on his shoulder for twenty miles while he ate a box of figs.

Homer is now a solid citizen, with his money put into a place down at the lower end of the valley, instead of lying in the bank at the mercy of some unscrupulous woman with little ones. And here this summer, with his own work light, he's been helping me out as riding boss; or, at least I been lavishing money on him for that.

A fine, dependable hand, too! Here was this bunch of stock to be got in from Madeline—them Bolshevik ain't gathered more'n two thirds of 'em; and there's more to come in from over Horse Fly Mountain way, and still another bunch from out of the Sheep Creek country—the busiest month in a bad year, when I needed every man, woman, and child to be had, and here comes Homer, the mush-head, taking two days off!

"Yes'm, Mis' Pettengill; I just got to take time off to go down to Red Gap. It's a matter of life and death. Yes'm; it is. No'm; I wouldn't dast send any one, and Minna agrees I'm the only one to go—" Shucks!

The lady built a cigarette and, after lighting it, turned back to scan the mesa we had descended. The cattle now crowded down the narrow way into the valley, their dust mounting in a high, slow cloud.

"Call yourself a cowman, do you?" she demanded of the absent Homer. "Huh!" Then we rode on.

"What was the matter of life and death?" I asked.

Ma Pettengill expelled cigarette smoke venomously from inflated nostrils like a tired dragon.

"The matter of life and death was that he had to get two teething rings for the twins."

"Twins!"

"Oh, the valley got it's final laugh at Homer! Twins, sure! Most of us laughed heartily, though there was mothers that said it was God's judgment on the couple. Of course Homer and Minna ain't took it that way. They took it more like they had been selected out of the whole world as a couple worthy to have a blessed miracle happen to 'em. There might of been single babies born now and then to common folks, but never a case of twins—and twins like these! Marvels of strength and beauty, having to be guarded day and night against colic and kidnappers.

"They had 'em down to the post office at Kulanche the other day showing 'em off, each one in a red shawl; and sneering at people with only one. And this imbecile Homer says to me:

"'Of course it can't be hoped,' he says, 'that this great world war will last that long; but if it could last till these boys was in shape to fight I bet it wouldn't last much after that. Yes, sir; little Roosevelt and Pershing would soon put an end to that scrap!'

"And now they're teething and got to have rubber rings. And no, he couldn't send any one down for 'em; and he couldn't order 'em by mail either, because they got to be just the right kind.

"'Poor little Pershing is right feverish with his gums,' says Homer, 'but little Roosevelt has got a front one through already. He bit my thumb yesterday with it—darned near to the bone. He did so!'

"Calls himself a cowman, does he? He might of been—once. Now he ain't no more than a woman's home companion!"



VIII

CAN HAPPEN!

Lew Wee, prized Chinese chef of the Arrowhead Ranch, had butchered, cooked, and served two young roosters for the evening meal with a finesse that cried for tribute. As he replaced the evening lamp on the cleared table in the big living room he listened to my fulsome praise of his artistry as Marshal Foch might hear me say that I considered him a rather good strategist. Lew Wee heard but gave no sign, as one set above the petty adulation of compelled worshipers. Yet I knew his secret soul made festival of my words and would have been hurt by their withholding. This is his way. Not the least furtive lightening of his subtle eyes hinted that I had pleased him.

He presently withdrew to his tiny room off the kitchen, where, as was his evening custom for half an hour, he coaxed an amazing number of squealing or whining notes from his two-stringed fiddle. I pictured him as he played. He would be seated in his wicker armchair beside a little table on which a lamp glowed, the room tightly closed, window down, door shut, a fast-burning brown-paper cigarette to make the atmosphere more noxious. After many more of the cigarettes had made it all but impossible, Lew Wee, with the lamp brightly burning, as it would burn the night through—for devils of an injurious sort and in great numbers will fearlessly enter a dark room—he would lie down to refreshing sleep. That fantasy of ventilation! Lew Wee always sleeps in an air-tight room packed with cigarette smoke, and a lamp turned high at his couchside; and Lew Wee is hardy.

He played over and over now a plaintive little air of minors that put a gentle appeal through two closed doors. It is one he plays a great deal. He has told me its meaning. He says—speaking with a not unpleasant condescension—that this little tune will mean: "Life comes like a bird-song through the open windows of the heart." It sounds quite like that and is a very satisfying little song, with no beginning or end.

He played it now, over and over, wanderingly and at leisure, and I pictured his rapt face above the whining fiddle; the face, say, of the Philosopher Mang, sage of the second degree and disciple of Confucius, who was lifted from earth by the gods in a time we call B.C. but which was then thought to be a fresh, new, late time; the face of subtle eyes and guarded dignity. And I wondered, as I had often wondered, whether Lew Wee, lone alien in the abiding place of mad folks, did not suffer a vast homesickness for his sane kith, who do not misspend their days building up certain grotesque animals to slaughter them for a dubious food. True, he had the compensation of believing invincibly that the Arrowhead Ranch and all its concerns lay upon his own slightly bowed shoulders; that the thing would fast crumble upon his severance from it. But I questioned whether this were adequate. I felt him to be a man of sorrow if not of tragedy. Vaguely he reached me as one who had survived some colossal buffeting.

As I mused upon this Ma Pettengill sorted the evening mail and to Lew Wee she now took his San Francisco newspaper, Young China, and a letter. Half an hour later Lew Wee brought wood to replenish the fire. He disposed of this and absently brushed the hearth with a turkey wing. Then he straightened the rug, crossed the room, and straightened on the farther wall a framed portrait in colour of Majestic Folly, a prize bull of the Hereford strain. Then he drew a curtain, flicked dust from a corner of the table, and made a slow way to the kitchen door, pausing to alter slightly the angle of a chair against the wall.

Ma Pettengill, at the table, was far in the Red Gap Recorder for the previous day. I was unoccupied and I watched Lew Wee. He was doing something human; he was lingering for a purpose. He straightened another chair and wiped dust from the gilt frame of another picture, Architect's Drawing of the Pettengill Block, Corner Fourth and Main streets, Red Gap, Washington. From this feat he went softly to the kitchen door, where he looked back; hung waiting in the silence. He had made no sound, yet he had conveyed to his employer a wish for speech. She looked up at him from the lamp's glow, chin down, brows raised, and eyes inquiring of him over shining nose glasses.

"My Uncle's store, Hankow, burn' down," said Lew Wee.

"Why, wasn't that too bad!" said Ma Pettengill.

"Can happen!" said Lew Wee positively.

"Too bad!" said Ma Pettengill again.

"I send him nine hundred dollars your money. Money burn, too," said Lew Wee.

"Now, now! Well, that certainly is too bad! What a shame!"

"Can happen!" affirmed Lew Wee.

It was colourless. He was not treating his loss lightly nor yet was he bewailing it.

"You put your money in the bank next time," warned his employer sharply, "instead of letting it lie round in some flimsy Chinee junk shop. They're always burning."

Lew Wee regarded her with a stilled face.

"Can happen!" he again murmured.

He was the least bit insistent, as if she could not yet have heard this utterly sufficing truth. Then he was out; and a moment later the two-stringed fiddle whined a little song through two closed doors.

I said something acute and original about the ingrained fatalism of the Oriental races.

Ma Pettengill laid down her paper, put aside her glasses, and said, yes, Chinee one fatal race; feeling fatal thataway was what made 'em such good help. Because why? Because, going to work at such-and-such a place, this here fatal feeling made 'em think one place was no worse than another; so why not stick here? If other races felt as fatal as the Chinee race it would make a grand difference in the help problem. She'd bet a million dollars right now that a lot of people wished the Swedes and Irish had fatal feelings like that.

I said Lew Wee had the look of one ever expecting the worst; even more than the average of his race.

"It ain't that," said my hostess. "He don't expect anything at all; or mebbe everything. He takes what comes. If it's good or bad, he says, 'Can happen!' in the same tone of voice; and that ends it. There he is now, knowing that all this good money he saved by hard labour has gone up in smoke, and paying the loss no more attention that if he'd merely broke a string on that squeaky long-necked contraption he saws."

"He seems careless enough with his money, certainly."

"Sure, because he don't believe it does the least good to be careful."

From a cloth sack the speaker poured tobacco into a longitudinally creased brown paper and adeptly fashioned something in the nature of a cigarette.

"Ain't I been telling him for a year to buy Liberty Bonds with his money? He did buy two, being very pro-American on account of once having a violent difference with a German; and he's impressed with the button the Government lets him wear for it. He feels like the President has made him a mandarin or something; but if the whole Government went flooey to-morrow he'd just say, 'Can happen!' and pick up his funny fiddle. Of course it ain't human, but it helps to keep help. I had him six years now, and the only thing that can't happen is his leaving. I don't say there wasn't reasons why he first took the place."

Reasons? So there had been reasons in the life of Lew Wee. I had suspected as much. I found something guarded and timid and long-suffering in his demeanour. He bore, I thought, the searing memory of an ordeal.

"Reasons!" I said, waiting.

"Reasons for coming this far in the first place. Wanted to save his life. I don't know why, with that fatal idea he sticks to. Habit, probably. Anyway, he had trouble saving it—kind of a feverish week."

She lighted the cigarette and chuckled hoarsely between the first relishing whiffs of it.

"Yes, sir; that poor boy believes the country between here and the coast is inhabited by savages; wild hill tribes that try to exterminate peaceful travellers; a low kind of outlaws that can't understand a word you tell 'em and act violent if you try to say it over. And having got here, past the demons, I figure he's afraid to go back. I don't blame him."

Ordinarily, this would have been enough. Now the lady merely smoked and chuckled. When I again uttered "Well?" with a tinge of rebuke, she came down from her musing, but into another and distant field. It was the field of natural history, of zoology, of vertebrates, mammals, furred quadrupeds—or, in short, skunks. One may as well be blunt in this matter.

Ma Pettengill said the skunk got too little credit for its lovely character, it being the friendliest wild animal known to man and never offensive except when put upon. Wasn't we all offensive at those times? And just because the skunk happened to be superbly gifted in this respect, was that any reason to ostracize him?

"I ain't sayin' I'd like to mix with one when he's vexed," continued the lady judicially; "but why vex 'em? They never look for trouble; then why force it on their notice? Take one summer, years ago, when Lysander John and I had a camp up above Dry Forks. My lands! Every night after supper the prettiest gang of skunks would frolic down off the hillside and romp round us. Here would come Pa and Ma in the lead, and mebbe a couple of aunts and uncles and four or five of the cunningest little ones, and they'd all snoop fearlessly round the cook fire and the grub boxes, picking up scraps of food—right round under my feet, mind you—and looking up now and then and saying, 'Thank you!' plain as anything, and what lovely weather we're having, and why don't you come up and see us some time?—and so on. They kept it up for a month while we was there; and I couldn't want neater, nicer neighbours.

"Lysander John, he used to get some nervous, especially after one chased him back into the tent late one night; but it was only wanting to play like a mere puppy, I tells him. He'd heard a noise and rushed out, and there the little thing was kind of waltzing in the moonlight, whirling round and round and having a splendid time. When it came bounding toward him—I guess that was the only time in his life Lysander John was scared helpless. He busted back into the tent a mere palsied wreck of his former self; but the cute little minx just come up and sniffed at the flap in a friendly way, like it wanted to reassure him. I wanted him to go out and play with it in the moonlight. He wouldn't. I liked 'em round the place, they was so neighbourly and calm. Of course if I'd ever stepped on one, or acted sudden—

"They also tame easy and make affectionate pets. Ralph Waldo Gusted, over on Elkhorn, that traps 'em in winter to make First-Quality Labrador Sealskin cloaks—his children got two in the house they play with like kittens; and he says himself the skunk has been talked about in a loose and unthinking way. He says a pet skunk is not only a fine mouser but leads a far more righteous life than a cat, which is given to debauchery and cursing in the night. Yes, sir; they're the most trusting and friendly critters in all the woods if not imposed upon—after that, to be sure!"

I said yes, yes, and undoubtedly, and all very interesting, and well and good in its place; but, really, was this its place? I wanted Lew Wee's reasons for believing in the existence of savage hill tribes between there and San Francisco.

"Yes; and San Francisco is worse," said the lady. "He believes that city to be ready for mob violence at any moment. Wild crowds get together and yell and surge round on the least provocation. He says it's different in China, the people there not being crazy."

"Well, then, we can get on with this mystery."

So Ma Pettengill said we could; and we did indeed.

This here chink seems to of been a carefree child up to the time the civilized world went crazy with a version for him. He was a good cook and had a good job at a swell country club down the peninsula from San Francisco. The hours was easy and he was close enough to the city to get in once or twice a week and mingle with his kind. He could pass an evening with the older set, playing fan-tan and electing a new president of the Chinee race, or go to the Chinee theatre and set in a box and chew sugar cane; or he could have a nice time at the clubrooms of the Young China Progressive Association, playing poker for money. Once in a while he'd mix in a tong war, he being well thought of as a hatchet man—only they don't use hatchets, but automatics; in fact, all Nature seemed to smile on him.

Well, right near this country club one of his six hundred thousand cousins worked as gardener for a man, and this man kept many beautiful chickens—so Lew Wee says. And he says a strange and wicked night animal crept into the home of these beautiful birds and slew about a dozen of 'em by biting 'em under their wings. The man told his cousin that the wicked night animal must be a skunk and that his cousin should catch him in a trap. So the cousin told Lew Wee that the wicked night animal was a skunk and that he was going to catch him in a trap. Lew Wee thought it was interesting.

He went up to the city and in the course of a pleasant evening at fan-tan he told about the slain chickens that were so beautiful, and how the night animal that done it would be caught in a trap. A great friend of Lew Wee's was present, a wonderful doctor. Lew Wee still says he is the most wonderful doctor in the world, knowing things about medicines that the white doctors can't ever find out, these being things that the Chinee doctors found out over fifteen thousand years ago, and therefore true. The doctor's name was Doctor Hong Foy, and he was a rich doctor. And he says to Lew Wee that he needs a skunk for medicine, and if any one will bring him a live skunk in good condition he will pay twenty-five dollars in American money for same.

Lew Wee says he won't be needing that skunk much longer—or words to that effect—because he will get this one from the trap. Doctor Hong Foy is much pleased and says the twenty-five American dollars is eager to become Lew Wee's for this animal, alive and in good condition.

Lew Wee goes back, and the next day his cousin says he set a trap and the night skunk entered it, but he was strong like a lion and had busted out and bit some more chickens under the wing, and then went away from there. He showed Lew Wee the trap and Lew Wee seen it wasn't the right kind, but he knows how to make the right kind and will do so if the skunk can become entirely his property when caught.

The cousin, without the least argument, agreed heartily to this. He was honest enough. He explained carefully that the skunk was wished to be caught to keep it from biting chickens under the wing, causing them to die, and not for any value whatever it might have to the person catching it. He says it will be beneficial to catch the skunk, but not to keep it; that a skunk is not nice after being caught, and Lew Wee is more than welcome to it if he will make a right trap. The cousin himself was probably one of these fatal "Can happen!" boys. When Lew Wee says he must have the skunk alive and in good condition he just looked at him in a distant manner that Lew Wee afterward remembered; but he only said: "Oh, very well!" in his native language.

Lew Wee then found a small peaked-roofed chicken coop, with stout slats on it, and made a figure-four trap, and put something for bait on the pointed stick and set the trap, and begun right off to squander twenty-five dollars that was to come as easy as picking it up in the road.

There wasn't any breakfast trade at the country club and Lew Wee was able to get over across the golf links to the chicken place early the next morning. The cousin was some distance from the chicken place, hoeing a bed of artichokes, but he told Lew Wee his trap had been a very wonderful trap and the night animal was safe caught. Lew Wee was surprised at his cousin's indifference and thought he should of been over there looking at the prize. But not so. The cousin was keeping some distance off. He just told Lew Wee that there was his animal and that he should take it away with as little disturbance as possible, which would be better far and near for all concerned. He was strangely cool about it.

But Lew Wee was full of pleasant excitement and run swiftly to his trap. Sure enough! There was a nice big beautiful skunk in his trap. Lew Wee had never seen one. He said it was more beautiful than a golden pheasant, with rich, shiny black fur and a lovely white stripe starting from its face and running straight down on each side of its back; and it had a wonderful waving tail, like a plume. He looked at it joyfully through the slats. It was setting down comfortably when he come up; so he spoke to it in a friendly way. Then it got up and yawned and stretched itself, looking entirely self-possessed, but kind of bored, I suppose, like this was a poor sort of practical joke to play on a gentleman; so now would someone kindly lift this box off him?

The proud owner danced about it in great glee and told it how the nice doctor wouldn't hurt it any, but would give it a good home, with chicken for supper, mebbe, and so on. Then he went back to his cousin and give him a pack of cigarettes, out of his overflowing heart, and asked where was something he could put his wild animal in and take it to town to his great friend Doctor Hong Foy, who had a desire for it.

The cousin took the cigarettes, but he looked at Lew Wee a long time, like he didn't understand Chinee at all. Lew Wee said it all over again. He wanted something to take the wild animal to town in, because the chicken coop it was now in hadn't any bottom; and was too big, anyway.

The cousin again looked at him a long time, like one in a trance. Then, without any silly talk, he went over to the barn and handed Lew Wee a bran sack.

Lew Wee said that was just the thing; and would the cousin come over and help him in case the animal would be timid and not want to go in the sack? The cousin said he would not. And he didn't go back to the artichokes. He went to a bed of cauliflower clear at the other end of the garden, after giving Lew Wee another of them long "Can happen!" looks, which signify that we live in a strange and terrible world.

Lew Wee went back alone to his prize, finding it still calm, like a gentleman in his club. He reassured it with some more cheerful words. He had a thought right then, he says; kind of a sudden fear. He had been told the first day by his cousin, and also by his great friend Doctor Hong Foy, that the skunk gave out a strong scent disagreeable to many people. But this one he'd caught didn't have any scent of any kind. So mebbe that meant it wasn't in good condition and Doctor Hong Foy wouldn't wish it for twenty-five dollars. However, it was sure a skunk, and looked strong and healthy and worth taking in to the doctor, who could then tell about its condition.

Lew Wee opened the neck of the bag, laid it on the ground close by him, got down on his knees, and carefully raised one side of the coop. The wild animal looked more beautiful than ever; and it didn't seem alarmed, but just the tiniest mite suspicious. It must of looked like it was saying it was entirely willing to be friendly, but you couldn't ever tell about these Chinamen. Lew Wee reached a hand slowly over toward it and it moved against the back of the coop, very watchful. Then Lew Wee made a quick grab and caught the back of its neck neatly.

Of course this showed at once that a Chinaman wasn't to be trusted, and Lew Wee says it put up a fierce fight, being so quick and muscular as to surprise him. He was fully engaged for at least thirty seconds; the animal clawed and squirmed and twisted, and it bit in the clinches and almost got away. He was breathing hard when he finally got his wild animal into the sack and the neck tied.

He says he didn't actually realize until then, what with all the excitement, that something had gone kind of wrong. He was not only breathing hard but it was hard breathing. He says he felt awful good at that moment. He had been afraid his animal might not be in good condition, but it undoubtedly was. He thought right off that if one in just ordinary good condition was worth twenty-five dollars to Doctor Hong Foy, then this one might be worth as much as thirty-five, or even forty. He thought it must be the best wild animal of that kind in the world.

So he picked up the sack, with his prize squirming and swearing inside, and threw it over his shoulder and started back to the country club. He stopped a minute to thank his cousin once more; but his cousin seen him coming and run swiftly off in a strange manner, as if not wishing to be thanked again. Then Lew Wee went on across a field and over the golf links. His idea was to take the little animal to his room in the clubhouse and keep it there until night, when he could take it into town and get all that money for it. He was quite happy and wished he hadn't scared the poor thing so.

He thought when he got to his room he might let it out of the sack to play round there in freedom during the day. He spent the twenty-five dollars for different things on the way over the golf links. He told me he knew perfectly well that his pet would be likely to attract notice; but he didn't realize how much. A Chinese is a wonder. He can very soon get used to anything.

But Lew Wee never did get to his room again. When he got up near the clubhouse some fine people were getting out of a shiny purple motor car as big as a palace, and they had golf sticks in bags. One of 'em was a big red-faced man with a fierce gray moustache, and this man begun to yell at Lew Wee in a remarkable manner. The words being in a foreign language, he couldn't make 'em out well, but the sense of it was that the big man wanted him to go away from there. Lew Wee knew he wasn't working for this man, who was only a club member; so he paid no attention to him beyond waving his hand friendly, and went on round toward the back entrance.

Then out of the side entrance come the chief steward, also yelling, and this was the man he was working for; so he stopped to listen. It wasn't for long. He lost a good job as cook in no time at all. Of course that never bothers a Chinee any; but when he started in to get his things from his room the steward picked up a golf club with an iron end and threatened to hurt him, and some of the kitchen help run round from the back with knives flashing, and the big red-faced man was yelling to the steward to send for a policeman, and some ladies that had got out of another big car had run halfway across the golf links, as if pursued by something, and more people from the inside come to the door and yelled at him and made motions he should go away; so he thought he better not try to get his things just then. He couldn't see why all the turmoil, even if he had got something in prime condition for his friend Doctor Hong Foy.

It was noticeable, he thought; but nothing to make all this fuss about, especially if the fools would just let him get it to his own room, where it could become quiet again, like when he had first seen it in the trap. But he saw they wasn't going to let him, and the big man had gone in the front way and was now shaking both fists at him through a side window that was closed; so he thought, all right, he'd leave 'em flat, without a cook—and a golf tournament was on that day, too! He was twenty-five dollars to the good and he could easy get another job.

So he waved good-bye to all of 'em and went down the road half a mile to the car line. He was building air castles by that time. He says it occurred to him that Doctor Hong Foy might like many of these wild animals, at twenty-five dollars each; and he might take up the work steady. It was exciting and sporty, and would make him suddenly rich. Mebbe it wasn't as pleasant work as his cousin did, spending his time round gardens and greenhouses; but it was more adventurous. He really liked it, and he would get even more used to it in time so he wouldn't hardly notice it at all. As he stood there waiting for a trolley car he must of thought up a whole headful of things he'd buy with all these sudden emoluments. Several motor cars passed while he waited and he noticed that folks in 'em all turned to look at him in an excited way. But he knew all Americans was crazy and liable to be mad about something.

Pretty soon a car stopped and some people got off the front end. They stopped short and begun to look all round 'em in a frightened manner—two ladies and a child and an old man. The conductor also stepped off and looked round in a frightened manner; but he jumped back on the car quick. Lew Wee then hopped on to the back platform, with his baggage, just as it started on. It started quick and was going forty miles an hour by the time he'd got the door open. The two women in the car screamed at him like maniacs, and before he'd got comfortably set down the conductor had opened the front door and started for him. He got halfway down the car; then he started back and made a long speech at him from the front end, while the car stopped like it had hit a mountain, throwing everyone off their seats.

Lew Wee gathered that he was being directed to get off the car quickly. The other passengers had crowded back by the conductor and was telling him the same thing. One old gentleman with a cane, who mebbe couldn't walk good, had took up his cane and busted a window quick and had his head outside. Lew Wee thought he was an anarchist, busting up property that way. Also the motorman, who had stopped the car so soon, was now shaking a brass weapon at him over the heads of the others. So he thought he might as well get off the car and save all this talk. He'd got his fare out, but he put it back in his pocket and picked up his sack and went out in a very dignified way, even if they was threatening him. He knew he had something worth twenty-five dollars in his sack, and they probably didn't know it or they wouldn't act that way.

He set down and waited for another car, still spending his money.

The next one slowed down for him; but all at once it started up again more swift than the wind, he says; and he could see that the motorman was a coward about something, because he looked greatly frightened when he flew by the spot. He never saw one go so fast as this one did after it had slowed up for him. It looked like the motorman would soon be arrested for driving his car too fast. He then had the same trouble with another car; it slowed up, but was off again before it stopped, and the people in it looked out at him kind of horrified.

It begun to look like he wasn't going to ride to the city in a trolley car. Pretty soon along the road come a Japanese man he knew. His name was Suzuki Katsuzo; and Lew Wee says that, though nothing but a Japanese, he is in many respects a decent man. Suzuki passed him, going round in a wide circle, and stopped to give him some good advice. He refused to come a step nearer, even after Lew Wee told him that what he had in the sack was worth a lot of money.

Suzuki was very polite, but he didn't want to come any nearer, even after that. He told Lew Wee he was almost certain they didn't want him on street cars with it, no matter if it was worth thousands of dollars. It might be worth that much, and very likely was if the price depended on its condition. But the best and most peaceful way for Lew Wee was to find a motor car going that way and ask the gentleman driving it to let him ride; he said it would be better, too, to pick out a motor car without a top to it, because the other kind are often shut up too tightly for such affairs as this, like street cars. He said the persons in street cars are common persons, and do not care if a thing is worth thousands of dollars or not if they don't like to have it in the car with them. He didn't believe it would make any difference to them if something like this was worth a million dollars in American gold.

So Lew Wee thanked Suzuki Katsuzo, who went quickly on his way; and then he tried to stop a few motor cars. It seemed like they was as timid as street cars. People would slow up when they seen him in the road and then step on the gas like it was a matter of life and death. Lew Wee must of said "Can happen!" a number of times that morning.

Finally, along come a German. He was driving a big motor truck full of empty beer kegs, and Lew Wee says the German himself was a drinking man and had been drinking so much beer that he could nearly go to sleep while driving the car.

He slowed up and stopped when he saw Lew Wee in the middle of the road. Lew Wee said he wanted to go to San Francisco and would give the driver a dollar to let him ride back on the beer kegs. The driver said: "Let's see the dollar." And took it and said: "All right, John; get up." Then he sniffed the air several times and said it seemed like there had been a skunk round. Lew Wee didn't tell him he had it in his bag because the driver might know how much it was worth and try foul play on him to get possession of it. So they started on, and the German, who had been drinking, settled into a kind of doze at the wheel.

Lew Wee was up on the beer kegs and enjoying himself like a rich gentleman riding to the city in his motor car. It was kind of nice, in spite of being used to his pet, to be going through the air so fast.

The German seemed to be getting sobered up by something, and after about five or six miles he stopped the car and yelled to Lew Wee that a skunk had been round this place, too; and mebbe he had run over one. Lew Wee looked noncommittal; but the German was getting more wakeful every minute, and after a couple more miles he pulled up again and come round to where Lew Wee was. He says it seems like a skunk has been round everywhere; and, in fact, it seems to be right here now. He sees the sack and wants to know what's in it. But he don't give Lew Wee a chance to lie about it. He was thoroughly awake now and talked quite sober but bitterly. He ordered Lew Wee to get off of there quickly. Lew Wee says he swore at him a lot. He thinks it was in German. He ain't sure of the language, but he knows it was swearing.

He wasn't going to get off, at first; but the German got a big stick from the roadside and started for him, so he climbed down the other side and started to run. But the cowardly German didn't chase him a single step. He got back in his seat and started down the road quicker than it looked like his truck had been able to travel.

Anyway, Lew Wee was a lot nearer to town, owing to the German not having been sensitive at first; and if worst come to worst he could walk. It looked like he'd have to. Then he saw he'd have to walk, anyway, because this brutal German that put him off the truck hadn't give him back his dollar, and that was all he had. He now put the First High Curse of the One Hundred and Nine Malignant Devils on all Germans. It is a grand curse, he says, and has done a lot of good in China. He was uncertain whether it would work away from home; but he says it did. Every time he gets hold of a paper now he looks for the place where Germans in close formation is getting mowed down by machine-gun fire.

But his money was gone miles away from him by this time; so he started his ten-mile walk. I don't know. It's always been a mystery to me how he could do it. He could get kind of used to it himself, and mebbe he thought the public could do as much. It was an interesting walk he had.

At first, he thought he was only attracting the notice of the vulgar, like when some American ruffians doing a job of repair work on the road threw rocks at him when he stopped to rest a bit. But he soon noticed that rich ladies and gentlemen also seemed to shun him as he passed through little towns. He carried his impetuous burden on a stick over his shoulder and at a distance seemed to be an honest workman; but people coming closer didn't look respectfully at him, by any means. It seemed as if some odium was attached to him.

Once he stopped to pick a big red rose from a bush that hung over the wall in front of a pretty place, and a beautiful child dressed like a little princess stood there; and, being fond of children, like all Chinee men, he spoke to her; but a nurse screamed and run out at him and yelled something in another foreign language. He thinks it was swearing, same as the German, though she looked like a lady. So he went sadly on, smelling of his lovely rose from time to time.

The only way I can figure out how he got through them suburbs is that parties wanted to have him arrested or shot, or something, but wouldn't let him stick round long enough to get it done; they was in two minds about him, I guess: they wished to detain him, but also wished harder to have him away.

So he went on uninjured, meeting murderous looks and leaving excitement in his trail; hearing men threaten him even while they run away from him. It hurt him to be shunned this way—him that had always felt so friendly toward one and all. He couldn't deny it by this time: people was shunning him on account of what Doctor Hong Foy wanted alive and in good condition.

As he worked his way into the city the excitement mounted higher. He took to the middle of the street where he could. Mobs collected behind him and waved things at him and looked like they would lynch him; but they didn't come close enough for that. It seemed like he bore a charmed life in spite of this hostility. When he'd got well into the city a policeman did come up and start to arrest him, but thought better of it and went round a corner. It made him feel like a social cull or an outcast, or something.

He wasn't a bit foolish about his cunning little pet by this time. And it looked as if these crowds of people that gathered behind him would finally get their nerve up to do something with him. They was getting bigger and acting more desperate. When he was on the sidewalk he swept people off into the road like magic, and when he was in the street they would edge close in to the buildings.

It really hurt him. He'd always liked Americans, in spite of their foreign ways, and they had seemed to like him; but now all at once they was looking on him as a yellow peril. He still kept his rose to smell of. He said it was a sweet comfort to him at a time when the whole world had turned against him for nothing at all.

He made for Chinatown by the quietest streets he could pick out, though even on them hardly escaping the lawless mob. But at last he got to the street where Doctor Hong Foy's office was. It was largely a Chinese street and lots of his friends lived there; but even now, when you'd think he'd get kind words and congratulations, he didn't.

His best friends regarded him as one better let alone and made swift gestures of repulsion when he passed 'em. Quite a crowd followed at a safe distance and gathered outside when he went into Doctor Hong Foy's office. It was a kind of store on the ground floor, so Lew Wee says, with shelves full of rich old Chinee medicines that had a certain powerful presence of their own. But even in here Doctor Hong Foy should of known beyond a doubt what his friend had brought him.

It seemed the doctor had to make sure. He wasn't of the same believing nature as the street-car people, and the German and others. He wanted to be shown. So they undone the sack and opened it down to where Doctor Hong Foy could make sure. But their work was faulty and the wild animal didn't like handling after its day of mistreatment. It had been made morbid, I guess. Anyway, it displayed an extremely nervous tendency, and many impetuous movements, and bit Doctor Hong Foy in the thumb. Then the first owner tried to grab him and the pet wriggled away on to a tray of dried eel gizzards, or something, and off that to the open door.

The little thing run into the front of the large crowd that had waited outside and had a wonderful effect on it. Them in the centre tried to melt away, but couldn't on account of them on the outside; so there was fights and accidents, and different ones tromped on, and screams of fear. And this brought a lot bigger crowd that pressed in and made the centre ones more anguished. I don't know. That poor animal had been imposed on all day and must of been overwrought. It was sore vexed by now and didn't care who knew it. Lots of 'em did.

Of course Lew Wee dashed out after his property, hugging the sack to his chest; and, of course, he created just as much disturbance as his little pet had. Policemen was mingling with the violence by this time and adding much to its spirit. One public-spirited citizen grabbed Lew Wee in spite of its being distasteful; but he kicked the poor man on the kneecap and made a way through the crowd without too much trouble.

He wasn't having any vogue whatever in that neighbourhood. He run down a little side street, up an alley, and into a cellar he knew about, this cellar being the way out of the Young China Progressive Association when they was raided up the front stairs on account of gambling at poker.

He could hear the roar of the mob clear from there. It took about an hour for this to die down. People would come to see what all the excitement was about, and find out almost at once; then they'd try to get away, and run against others coming to find out, thus producing a very earnest riot. There was mounted policemen and patrol wagons and many arrests, and an armed posse hunting for the escaped pet and shooting up alleys at every little thing that moved. They never did find the pet—so one of Lew Wee's cousins wrote him; which made him sorry on account of Doctor Hong Foy and the twenty-five or mebbe thirty dollars.

He lay hid in this cellar till dark; then started out to find his friends and get something to eat. He darned near started everything all over again; but he dodged down another alley and managed to get some noodles and chowmain at the back door of the Hong-Kong Grill, where a tong brother worked. He begun to realize that he was a marked man. The mark didn't show; but he was. He didn't know what the law might do to him. It looked like at least twenty years in some penal institution, if not hanging; and he didn't want either one.

So he borrowed three dollars from the tong brother and started for some place where he could lead a quiet life. He managed to get to Oakland, though the deck hands on the ferryboat talked about throwing him overboard. But they let him live if he would stay at the back end till everyone, including the deck hands, was safe off or behind something when the boat landed. Then he wandered off into the night and found a freight train. He didn't care where he went—just somewhere they wouldn't know about his crime.

He rode a while between two freight cars; then left that train and found a blind baggage on a passenger train that went faster and near froze him to death. He got off, chilled in the early morning, at some little town and bought some food in a Chinee restaurant and also got warm. But he hadn't no more than got warm when he was put out of the place, right by his own people.

It was warm outside by this time, so he didn't mind it so much. The town did, though. It must of been a small town, but he says thousands of men chased him out of it about as soon as he was warmed up enough to run. He couldn't understand this, because how could they know he was the one that caused all that trouble in San Francisco?

He got a freight train outside the town and rode on and on. He says he rode on for weeks and weeks; but that's his imagination. It must of been about three days, with spells of getting off for food and to get warmed when he was freezing, and be chased by these wild hill tribes when he had done the latter. It put a crimp into his sunny nature—all this armed pursuit of him. He says if he had been a Christian, and believed in only one God, he would never of come through alive, it taking about seventy-four or five of his own gods to protect him from these maddened savages. He had a continuous nightmare of harsh words and blows. He wondered they didn't put him in jail; but it seemed like they only wanted to keep him going.

Of course it had to end. He got to Spokane finally and sneaked round to a friend that had a laundry; and this friend must of been a noble soul. He took in the outcast and nursed him with food and drink, and repeatedly washed his clothes. Wanting a ranch cook about that time, I got in touch with him through another cousin, who said this man wanted very much to go out into a safe country, and would never leave it because of unpleasantness in getting here.

It was ten days after he got there that I saw him first, and I'll be darned if he was any human sachet, even then. But after hearing his story I knew that time would once more make him fit for human association. He told me his story with much feeling this time and he told it to me about once a week for three months after he got here—pieces of it at a time. It used to cheer me a lot. He was always remembering something new. He said he liked the great silence and peace of this spot.

You couldn't tell him to this day that his belief about the savage hill tribes ain't sound. He believes anything "can happen" in that country down there. Doctor Hong Foy never paid him the twenty-five, of course, though admitting that he would of done so if the animal had not escaped, because he was in such good condition, for a skunk, that he was worth twenty-five dollars of any doctor's money. I don't know. As I say, they're friendly little critters; but it's more money that I would actually pay for one.

Through two closed doors the whine of the fiddle still penetrated. Perhaps Lew Wee's recent loss had moved him to play later than was his custom, pondering upon the curious whims that stir the gods when they start to make things happen. But he was still no cynic. Over and over he played the little air which means: "Life comes like a bird-song through the open windows of the heart."



IX

THE TAKER-UP

On a tired evening, in front of the Arrowhead's open fire, I lived over for the hundredth time a great moment. From the big pool under the falls four miles up the creek I had landed the Big Trout. Others had failed in years past; I, too, had failed more than once. But to-day!

At the hour of 9:46 A.M., to be exact, as one should in these matters, I had cast three times above the known lair of this fish. Then I cast a fourth time, more from habit than hope; and the fight was on. I put it here with the grim brevity of a communique. Despite stout resistance, the objective was gained at 9:55 A.M. And the Big Trout would weigh a good two and one half—say three or three and one quarter—pounds. These are the bare facts.

Verily it was a moment to live over; and to myself now I was more discursive. I vanquished the giant trout again and again, altering details of the contest at will—as when I waded into icy water to the waist in a last moment of panic. My calm review disclosed that this had been fanciful overcaution; but at the great crisis and for three minutes afterward I had gloried in the wetting.

Now again I three times idly flicked that corner of the pool with a synthetic moth. Again for the fourth time I cast, more from habit than hope. Then ensued that terrific rush from the pool's lucent depths—

"Yes, sir; you wouldn't need no two guesses for what she'd wear at a grand costume ball of the Allied nations—not if you knew her like I do." This was Ma Pettengill, who had stripped a Sunday paper from the great city to its society page. She lifted this under the lamp and made strange but eloquent noises of derision:

"You take Genevieve May now, of a morning, before that strong-arm Japanese maid has got her face rubbed down and calked with paints, oils, and putty, and you'd say to her, as a friend and well-wisher: 'Now look here, old girl, you might get by at that costume ball as Stricken Serbia or Ravaged Belgium, but you better take a well-meant hint and everlastingly do not try to get over as La Belle France. True, France has had a lot of things done to her,' you'd say, 'and she may show a blemish here and there; but still, don't try it unless you wish to start something with a now friendly ally—even if it is in your own house. That nation is already pushed to a desperate point, and any little thing might prove too much—even if you are Mrs. Genevieve May Popper and have took up the war in a hearty girlish manner.' Yes, sir!"

This, to be sure, was outrageous—that I should hear myself addressing a strange lady in terms so gross. Besides, I wished again to be present at the death of my favourite trout. I affected not to have heard. I affected to be thinking deeply.

It worked, measurably. Once more I scanned the pool's gleaming surface and felt the cold pricking of spray from the white water that tumbled from a cleft in the rocks above. Once more I wondered if this, by chance, might prove a sad but glorious day for a long-elusive trout. Once more I looked to the fly. Once more I—

"What I never been able to figger out—how can a dame like that fool herself beyond a certain age? Seams in her face! And not a soul but would know she got her hair like the United States acquired Louisiana. That lady's power of belief is enormous. And I bet she couldn't put two and two together without making a total wreck of the problem. Like fair time a year ago, when she was down to Red Gap taking up the war. She comes along Fourth Street in her uniform one morning, fresh from the hands of this hired accomplice of hers, and meets Cousin Egbert Floud and me where we'd stopped to talk a minute. She is bubbling with war activity as usual, but stopped and bubbled at us a bit—kind of hale and girlish, you might say. We passed the time of day; and, being that I'm a first-class society liar, I say how young and fresh she looks; and she gets the ball and bats it right back to Cousin Egbert.

"'You'd never dream,' says she, 'what my funny little mite of a Japanese maid calls me! You'd really never guess! She calls me Madam Peach Blossom! Isn't that perfectly absurd, Mr. Floud?'

"And poor Cousin Egbert, instead of giggling in a hearty manner and saying 'Oh, come now, Mrs. Popper! What's in the least absurd about that?'—like he was meant to and like any gentleman would of—what does the poor silly do but blink at her a couple of times like an old barn owl that's been startled and say 'Yes, ma'am!'—flat and cold, just like that!

"It almost made an awkward pause; but the lady pretended she had been saying something to me, so she couldn't hear him. That Cousin Egbert! He certainly wouldn't ever get very high in the diplomatic service of anybody's country.

"And here's this grand ball of the Allied nations in costume, give in Genevieve May's palatial residence. It must of throwed a new panic into Berlin when they got the news off the wire. Matter of fact, I don't see how them Germans held out long as they did, with Genevieve May Popper putting crimps into 'em with her tireless war activities. That proves itself they'd been long preparing for the fray. Of course, with Genevieve May and this here new city marshal, Fotch, the French got, it was only a question of time. Genevieve is sure one born taker-up! Now she's made a complete circle of the useful arts and got round to dancing again. Yes, sir!"

I affected to believe I was solitary in the room. This time it did not work—even measurably. Almost at once came: "I said she was the darndest woman in the world to take things up!" The tone compelled notice, so I said "Indeed!" and "You don't say!" with a cautiously extended space between them, and tried to go on thinking.

Then I knew the woman's full habit of speech was strong upon her and that one might no longer muse upon a caught trout—even one to weigh well up toward four pounds. So I remembered that I was supposed to be a gentleman.

"Go right ahead and talk," I murmured.

"Sure!" said the lady, not murmuring. "What in time did you think I was going to do?"

Yes, sir; I bet she's the greatest taker-up—bar none—the war has yet produced. She's took up France the latest. I understand they got a society of real workers somewhere that's trying to house and feed and give medicine and crutches to them poor unfortunates that got in the way of the dear old Fatherland when it took the lid off its Culture and tried to make the world safe—even for Germans; but I guess this here society gets things over to devastated France without much music or flourishes or uniforms that would interest Genevieve May.

But if that country is to be saved by costume balls of the Allied nations, with Genevieve May being La Belle France in a dress hardly long enough to show three colours, then it needn't have another uneasy moment. Genevieve stands ready to do all if she can wear a costume and dance the steps it cost her eight dollars a lesson to learn from one of these slim professionals that looks like a rich college boy.

It was this reckless dancing she'd took up when I first knew her, though she probably goes back far enough to of took up roller skating when that was sprung on an eager world; and I know she got herself talked about in 1892 for wearing bloomers on a bicycle. But we wasn't really acquainted till folks begun to act too familiar in public, and call it dancing, and pay eight dollars a lesson to learn something any of 'em that was healthy would of known by instinct at a proper time and place. Having lots of money, Genevieve May travelled round to the big towns, learning new steps and always taking with her one of these eight-dollar boys, with his hair done like a seal, to make sure she'd learn every step she saw.

She was systematic, that woman. If she was in Seattle and heard about a new step in San Francisco, she'd be on the train with her instructor in one hour and come back with the new step down pat. She scandalized Red Gap the year she come to visit her married daughter, Lucille Stultz, by introducing many of these new grips and clinches; but of course that soon wore off. Seems like we get used to anything in this world after it's done by well-dressed people a few times.

Then, as I say, these kind-hearted, music-loving Germans, with their strong affection for home life and little ones, started in to shoot the rest of the world up to German standards, and they hadn't burned more than a dozen towns in Belgium, after shooting the oldest and youngest and sexecuting the women—I suppose sexecution is what you might call it—before Genevieve took up the war herself.

Yes, sir—took it right up; no sooner said than done with her. It was really all over right then. The Germans might just as well of begun four years ago to talk about the anarchistic blood-lust of Woodrow Wilson as to wait until they found out the Almighty knows other languages besides German.

I believe the Red Cross was the first handle by which Genevieve May took up the war. But that costume is too cheap for one that feels she's a born social leader if she could only get someone to follow. She found that young chits of no real social standing, but with a pleasing exterior, could get into a Red Cross uniform costing about two-eighty-five and sell objects of luxury at a bazaar twice as fast as a mature woman of sterling character in the same simple garb.

So Genevieve May saw it had got to be something costing more money and beyond the reach of an element you wouldn't care to entertain in your own drawing room. And next thing I was up to Spokane, and here she is, dashing round the corridors of the hotel in a uniform that never cost a penny under two hundred and fifty, what with its being made by a swell tailor and having shiny boots with silver spurs and a natty tucked cap and a shiny belt that went round the waist and also up over one shoulder, with metal trimming, and so on. She was awful busy, darting hither and yon at the lunch hour, looking prettily worried and like she would wish to avoid being so conspicuous, but was foiled by the stares of the crowd.

Something always seemed to be happening to make her stand out; like in the restaurant, where, no sooner did she pick out just the right table, after some hesitation, and get nicely seated, than she'd see someone across the room at a far table and have to run over and speak. She spoke to parties at five distant tables that day, getting a scratchy lunch, I should say. One of the tables was mine. We wasn't what you'd call close friends, but she cut a swath clean across a crowded dining room to tell me how well I was looking.

Of course I fell for the uniform and wanted to know what it meant. Well, it meant that she was organizing a corps of girl ambulance drivers from the city's beet families. She was a major herself already, and was being saluted by he-officers. She said it was a wonderful work, and how did I think she looked in this, because it was a time calling for everyone's best, and what had I taken up for my bit? I was only raising beef cattle, so I didn't have any answer to that. I felt quite shamed. And Genevieve went back to her own table for another bite of food, bowing tolerantly to most of the people in the room.

I don't know how far she ever got with this girl's ambulance corps beyond her own uniform. She certainly made an imposing ambulance driver herself on the streets of that town. You'd see her big, shiny, light-blue limousine drive up, with two men on the seat and Genevieve, in uniform, would be helped out by one of 'em, and you knew right off you'd love to be a wounded soldier and be drove over shell-torn roads by her own hands.

Anyway, she got mad and left the ambulance service flat, getting into some sort of brawl with an adjutant general or something through wanting to take a mere detail out of his hands that he felt should stay right where it was, he being one of these offensive martinets and a stickler for red tape, and swollen with petty power. So Genevieve May said.

So she looked round for another way to start a few home fires burning on the other side of the Rhine. I forget what her next strategy was, but you know it was something cute and busy in a well-fitting uniform, and calculated to shorten the conflict if Germany found it out. You know that much.

I remember at one time she was riding in parades when the boys would march down to the station to go off and settle things in their own crude way. I lost track of what she was taking up for a while, but I know she kept on getting new uniforms till she must of had quite a time every morning deciding what she was going to be that day, like the father of the German Crown Prince.

Finally, last spring, it got to be the simple uniform of a waitress. She had figgered out that all the girls then taking the places of men waiters would get called for nurses sooner or later; so why shouldn't prominent society matrons like herself learn how to wait on table, so as to take the girl waiters' places when they went across? Not exactly that; they wouldn't keep on lugging trays forever in this emergency—only till they could teach new girls the trade, when some new ones come along to take the places of them that had met the call of duty.

So Genievieve agitated and wrote letters from the heart out to about two dozen society buds; and then she terrified the owner of the biggest hotel in her home town till he agreed to let 'em come and wait on table every day at lunch.

Genevieve May's uniform of a poor working girl was a simple black dress, with white apron, cuffs, and cap, the whole, as was right, not costing over six or seven dollars, though her string of matched pearls that cost two hundred thousand sort of raised the average. The other society buds was arrayed similar and looked like so many waitresses. Not in a hotel, mebbe, but in one of these musical shows where no money has been spared.

The lady had a glorious two days ordering these girls round as head waiter and seeing that everybody got a good square look at her, and so on. But the other girls got tired the second day. It was jolly and all tips went to the Red Cross, and the tips was big; but it was just as hard work as if they had really been poor working girls, with not enough recreation about it. So the third day they rebelled at the head waiter and made Genevieve herself jump in and carry out trays full of dishes that had served their purpose.

This annoyed Genevieve May very much. It not only upset discipline but made the arms and back ache. So she now went into the kitchen to show the cook how to cook in a more saving manner. Her intentions were beautiful; but the head cook was a sensitive foreigner, and fifteen minutes after she went into his kitchen he had to be arrested for threatening to harm the well-known society matron with a common meat saw.

The new one they got in his place next day let her mess round all she wanted to, knowing his job depended on it, though it was told that he got a heartless devil-may-care look in his eyes the minute he saw her making a cheap fish sauce. But he said nothing.

That hotel does a big business, but it fell off surprising the day after this, twenty-three people having been took bad with poison from something they'd et there at lunch. True, none of these got as fur as the coroner, so it never was known exactly what they'd took in; but the thing made a lot of talk at stricken bedsides and Genevieve spent a dull day denying that her cooking had done this outrage. Then, her dignity being much hurt, she wrote a letter to the papers saying this hotel man was giving his guests cheap canned goods that had done the trick.

Next morning this brought the hotel man and one of the best lawyers in the state of Washington up to the palatial Popper residence, making threats after they got in that no lady taking up war activities should be obliged to listen to. She got rattled, I guess, or had been dreaming or something. She told the hotel man and lawyer to Ssh! Ssh!—because that new cook had put ground glass in the lemon pie and she had a right to lull his suspicions with this letter to the papers, because she was connected with the Secret Service Department. She would now go back to the hotel and detect this spy committing sabotage on the mashed potatoes, or something, and arrest him—just like that! I don't know whatever put the idea into her head. I believe she had tried to join the Secret Service Department till she found they didn't have uniforms.

Anyway, this hotel man, like the cowardly dog he was, went straight off to some low sneak in the district attorney's office; and he went like a snake in the grass and found out it wasn't so; and a real officer come down on Genevieve May to know what she meant by impersonating a Secret Service agent. This brutal thug talked in a cold but rough way, and I know perfectly well this minute that he wasn't among those invited to the Popper costume ball of the Allied nations. He threw a fine scare into Genevieve May. For about a week she didn't know but she'd be railroaded to Walla Walla. She wore mere civilian creations and acted like a slacker.

But finally she saw the Government was going to live and let live; so she took up something new. It was still On to Berlin! with Genevieve May.

She wasn't quite up to pulling anything new in her home town; so she went into the outlying districts to teach her grandmother something. I didn't think up the term for it. That was thought up by G.H. Stultz who is her son-in-law and president of the Red Gap Canning Factory. This here new war activity she'd took up consisted of going rough to different places and teaching housewives how to practice economy in putting up preserves, and so on.

It ain't on record that she ever taught one single woman anything about economy, their hard-won knowledge beginning about where hers left off—which wasn't fur from where it started; but she did bring a lot of wholesome pleasure into their simple, hard-working lives.

In this new war activity it wasn't so much how you canned a thing as what you canned. Genevieve May showed 'em how to make mincemeat out of tomatoes and beets; how to make marmalade out of turnips and orange peel; how to make preserves out of apple peelings and carrots; and guava jelly out of mushmelon rinds, or some such thing. She'd go into towns and rent a storeroom and put up her canning outfit, hiring a couple of the lower classes to do the actual work, and invite women to bring in their truck of this kind and learn regular old rock-bottom economy. They'd come, with their stuff that should of been fattening shotes, and Genevieve May would lecture on how to can it. It looked through the glass like sure-enough human food.

Then, after she'd got 'em all taught, she'd say wouldn't it be nice of these ladies to let her sell all this canned stuff and give the proceeds to the different war charities! And there wasn't a woman that didn't consent readily, having tasted it in the cooking. Not a one of 'em wanted to take home these delicacies. It was right noble or cautious, or something. And after visiting six or eight of these communities Genevieve May had quite a stock of these magic delicacies on sale in different stores and was looking forward to putting the war firmly on its feet—only she couldn't get many reports of sales from this stock.

Then she got a dandy idea. She would come to the Kulanche County Fair at Red Gap, assemble all her stock there, give one of these here demonstrations in economic canning, and auction off the whole lot with a glad hurrah. She thought mebbe, with her influence, she might get Secretary Baker, or someone like that, to come out and do the auctioning—all under the auspices of Mrs. Genevieve May Popper, whose tireless efforts had done so much to teach the dear old Fatherland its lesson, and so on. She now had about three hundred jars and bottles of this stuff after her summer's work, and it looked important.

I got down to the county fair myself last year, having some sure-fire blue-ribbon stock there, and it was then that I hear G.H. Stultz talking about this here mother-in-law of his, he taking me aside at their home one night, so his wife, Lucille, wouldn't hear.

"This respected lady is trying to teach her grandmother how to suck eggs—no more, no less," he says. "Now she's coming here to pull something off. You watch her—that's all I ask. Everything that woman touches goes funny. Look how she poisoned those innocent people up at that hotel. And I'll bet this canned stuff she's going to sell off will kill even mere tasters. If she only hadn't come to my town! That woman don't seem to realize that I'm cursed with a German name and have to be miles above suspicion.

"Suppose she sells off this stuff! I give you my word she puts things in it that even a professional canning factory wouldn't dare to. And suppose it poisons off a lot of our best patriots! Do you think a mob will be very long blaming me for a hand in it? Why, it'll have me, in no time at all, reaching my feet down for something solid that has been carefully removed."

I tried to cheer the man up, but he was scared stiff.

"Mark my words," he says. "She'll pull a bloomer! If that woman could go into an innocent hotel kitchen, where every care is taken to keep things right, and poison off twenty-three people till they picked at the covers and had relatives wondering what might be in their safe-deposit boxes, think what she'd do in the great unsanitary outside, where she can use her imagination!

"There's but one salvation for me; I must have trusted agents in the crowd when that stuff is auctioned off, and they got to collar every last bottle of it, no matter what the cost. I have to lay down like a pup on the next bond drive, but this is my only hope. For the Lord's sake, don't you go there and start bidding things up, no matter who she gets for auctioneer! Don't you bid—even if Woodrow Wilson himself comes out."

That's the impression Genevieve May had made on her own daughter's husband, who is a clear-seeing man and a good citizen. And it looked like he must secretly buy up her output. She not only come to town with her canning outfit and her summer's stock of strange preserves, all beauteous in their jars, but she brought with her to auction off this stuff a regular French flying man with an honourable record.

She'd met this French officer in the city and entertained him at the palatial Popper home; and mebbe she'd hypnotized him. He wasn't in good shape, anyway. First place, he'd been fighting in the air for three years and had been wounded in five places—including the Balkans. Then, like that wasn't enough for one man, he'd been sent over here to teach our men to fly when they got a machine; and over here he'd fell out of a cloud one day when his brake or something went wrong, and this had give him a nice pleasant vacation on crutches.

Genevieve had fastened on him at a time when he probably hadn't the steely resistance Frenchmen been showing on the West Front. Or, being in a strange country, mebbe he didn't know when politeness to Genevieve May Popper would become mere cowardice. Anyway, he could talk English well enough; and Genevieve May brought him to town and made a big hit.

First thing she done was to set up her stock of canned goods in a section they give her in Horticultural Hall. Them three hundred bottles took up a lot of room and showed up grand between the fancy-work section, consisting of embroideries, sofa cushions, and silk patch quilts, and the art section, consisting of hand paintings of interesting objects by bright pupils in the public school. Then she put in her canning outfit, with a couple of hired natives to do the work while she lectured on the science of it and tried to get weak-minded patriots to taste things.

Genevieve May had a good time at these demonstrations, speaking in tones of oratory and persuasion and encouraging the tasters to take a chance. She certainly had discovered some entirely new flavours that the best chemists hadn't stumbled on. She was proud of this, but a heap prouder of her French flying man. When she wasn't thinking up new infamies with rutabagas and watermelon rinds, she'd be showing him off to the fair crowds. She give the impression when she paraded him that the French Army would of had few flyers if she hadn't stepped into the breach.

And mebbe she wasn't desperate with fear that some of the Red Gap society buds and matrons would want to stick in with nursing and attentions for the interesting invalid! Nothing like that with Genevieve May! She kept closer guard on that man than he would of got in the worst German prison camp. About the only other person in town she'd trust him to was Cousin Egbert Floud.

Cousin Egbert liked the Frenchman a lot at first, and rode him round town to see the canning factory and the new waterworks and the Chamber of Commerce, and Price's Addition to Red Gap, and so on. Also, he'd drag him all over the fair grounds to look at prize bulls and windmills and patent silos.

Cousin Egbert had refused from the first to taste any of Genevieve May's deviltry with the vegetable kingdom. He swore he was on a diet and the doctor wouldn't answer for his life if he even tasted anything outside. He was telling me that last day of the fair that the woman ought to be arrested for carrying on so, Genevieve May being now busy with some highly artificial ketchup made of carrots, and something else unimportant, with pure vegetable dyes.

"Yes; and she just tried to hand me that same old stuff about what her Japanese maid calls her," he says to me at this time. "She says I could never guess what that funny little mite calls her. And I says no, I never could of guessed it if she hadn't already told me; but I says I know it is Madam Peach Blossom, and that Jap maid sure is one funny little mite, thinking up a thing like that, the Japanese being a serious race and not given to saying laughable things."

That's Cousin Egbert all over. He ain't a bit like one of them courters of the old French courts that you read about in the Famous Crimes of History.

"Madam Peach Blossom!" he says, snickering bitterly. "Say, ain't them Japs got a great sense of humour! I bet what she meant was Madam Lemon Blossom!"

Anyway, Genevieve May trusted her flying man to this here brutal cynic when she wouldn't of trusted him to any of the younger, dancing set. And Cousin Egbert pretty near made him late for his great engagement to auction off the strange preserves. It was on this third day of the fair, and Genevieve May was highly excited about it.

She had her stock set up in tiers against the wall and looking right imposing in the polished glass; and she had a box in front where the Frenchman would stand when he did the auctioning.

That hall was hot, let me tell you, with the high sun beating down on the thin boards. I looked in a minute before the crowd come, and it looked like them preserves had sure had a second cooking, standing there day after day.

And this Cousin Egbert, when he should of been leading the Frenchman back to Horticultural Hall to the auction block, was dragging him elsewhere to see a highly exciting sight. So he said. He was innocent enough. He wanted to give that Frenchman a good time, he told me afterward. So he tells him something is going to take place over at the race track that will thrill him to the bone, and come on quick and hurry over!

The Frenchman is still using one crutch and the crowd is already surging in that direction; but after finding out it ain't any more silos or windmills, he relies on Cousin Egbert that it really is exciting, and they manage to get through the crowd, though it was excited even now and stepped on him and pushed him a lot.

Still he was game, all right. I've always said that. He was about as excited as the crowd; and Cousin Egbert was, too, I guess, by the time they had pushed up to the railing. I guess he was wondering what Wild Western kind of deviltry he was going to see now. Cousin Egbert had told him it wasn't a horse race; but he wouldn't tell him what it was, wishing to keep it for a glad surprise when the Frenchman would see it with his own eyes.

"Just you wait one minute now!" says Cousin Egbert. "You wait one minute and I bet you'll be glad you got through that rough crowd with me. You'd go through ten crowds like that, crutch or no crutch, to see what's going to be here."

The poor man was kind of used up, but he stands there waiting for the thrill, with Cousin Egbert beaming on him fondly, like a father that's going in one minute to show the little tots what Santa Claus brought 'em on the tree.

Then the Frenchman hears a familiar roar and a airplane starts up from the lower end of the field inside the track.

"There!" says Cousin Egbert. "Now I guess you're glad you pushed in here, leg or no leg. I knew it would be a dandy surprise for you. Yes, sir; the committee got a regular airplane to give a thrilling flight right here in front of us. You look up in the sky there and pretty soon you'll see it just as plain, sailing round and round like some great bird; and they say this man flying it is going to loop the loop twice in succession. Now I bet you're glad you come!"

Cousin Egbert says right at this minute he begun to take a dislike to the Frenchman. After he'd took all that trouble to get him there to see something exciting, the Frenchman just looked at him kind of sad for a long time, and then says he believes he'd rather go back some place where he can set down and rest his leg.

Cousin Egbert says he turned out to be like the Frenchmen you read about that is blase about everything in the world and kind of tired of life, not having the least bit of interest in whatever happens. But, of course, he was polite to his guest and helped push a way back through the crowd, with the crowd more excited than ever by this time, because the flying machine was right up in the air, hundreds of feet off the ground.

"You'll think I'm a liar," he says to me; "but it's the God's truth this Frenchman just kept pushing through that crowd and didn't even turn to look up in the air when this man was actually risking his life by looping the loop twice in succession. He never turned his head the least bit."

Cousin Egbert says, here he'd been up in one himself and knew what flying meant, but he probably wouldn't of took the least notice if this dare-devil had been killed right there before thousands.

"I don't understand it," he says. "It sure wouldn't be the least use boosting for a brighter and busier Red Gap if everybody was as cold-blooded as the French." He was right grouchy about the French after this.

Anyway, he got his suffering man back to Horticultural Hall somewhat the worse for being stepped on by the crowd; in fact, the Frenchman is kind of all in when he gets to the auction block. He sets right down on it looking white, and Genevieve May gets him a glass of water to revive him. Pretty soon he says he's nearly as well as ever, but that wasn't much.

Now the patriots for the auction begun to throng in and Genevieve May is once more proud and fluttering. She glances fondly at her noble array of jars, with these illegitimate preserves shining richly through, and she gets the Frenchman on his feet and onto the box; and the crowd cheers like mad and presses close. I was standing close to G.H. Stultz, and he whispers to me:

"My Lord! If there was only some means of getting that stock into the German commissary! But I'm told they analyze everything. Anyway, I got my bidders planted and I'll have to buy up the stock if it breaks me."