"Yes, I heard him through the dumb-waiter shaft," says Mrs. Shaw. "But I always borrow some youngsters for my poor widow act when I think I'm being shadowed; so you needn't get peeved."

"Of course not. How silly of him!" I puts in. "There, Steele, that's all straightened out, and here is the original Josie Vernon. What have you got to suggest?"

He stares at me blank, and then takes another look at Mrs. Shaw. I'll admit she wa'n't a fascinatin' sight.

"You don't mean," says he, whisperin' husky in my ear, "that you would do anything for such a creature?"

"She's on the list, ain't she?" says I.

"Ye-e-es," he admits; "but——"

"Let's ask the lady herself for a few more details, so we can have something definite to go on," says I. "Excuse us, Mrs. Shaw, for this little side debate; but we ain't quite made up our minds about you yet. Let's see—you was tellin' me about bringin' a breach of promise suit against Pyramid, and how he ran you out of town. You had a good case too, I expect?"

"What's the use of lying about it now?" says she. "It was a cheap bluff, that's all; one of Mr. Shaw's brilliant schemes. Oh, he was a schemer, Shaw was! Pretended to be a lawyer, Fletcher did, in those days. He was smooth enough for one, but too lazy. I didn't know that when I married him. What I didn't know about him then! But I learned. He thought he could scare Mr. Gordon into settling for a few thousand. Of course my claim was all bosh. Pyramid Gordon hardly knew I was in his office. Besides, I was married, anyway. He didn't guess that. But the bluff didn't work. We were the ones who were scared; scared stiff, too."

"H-m-m-m!" says I. "Not what you might call a pretty affair, was it?"

Mrs. Shaw don't wince at that. She just sneers cynical. "Life with Fletcher Shaw wasn't pretty at any stage of the game," says she. "Say, you don't think I picked my career, do you? True, I was only a girl; but I wasn't quite a fool. You will laugh, I suppose, but at twenty-two I had dreams, ambitions. I meant to be a woman doctor. I was teaching physiology and chemistry in a high school up in Connecticut, where I was born. In another year I could have begun my medical course. Then Fletcher came along, with his curly brown hair, his happy, careless smile, and his fascinating way of avoiding the truth. I gave up all my hopes and plans to go with him. That's what a woman does when she marries. I don't know why it should be so, but it is. Take my case: I had more brains, more energy, more character, than he. But he was a man; so I had to live his life. A rotten sort of life it was. And when it was over—well, look at me. I've learned to drink gin and to make a living as a fortune-teller. And the worst of it is, I don't care who knows it. Wanted details, didn't you? Well, you've got 'em."

I glances at J. Bayard, and finds him lookin' the other way with his lip curled. You couldn't blame him so much. Listenin' to a female party tell the story of her life ain't inspirin', and we're all apt to duck things of that kind. They may be true; but it's easier and pleasanter to look the other way. As for me, I want to, but can't. I just got to take things as they are and as they come. Forgettin' weeds in the back yard don't get rid of 'em. I'm apt to paw around and see where the roots spread to.

Meanwhile J. Bayard has stepped over by the window and signals me to follow. "Disgusting, isn't it?" says he. "And you see by this creature's own story that she doesn't deserve a penny of Pyramid's money. He was fooled by her, that's all."

"Not Pyramid," says I. "Didn't he have her married name on the slip too? So he must have found out."

"That's so," says Steele. "Well, suppose we give her fifty or so, and ship her off."

"That's kind of small, considerin' the pile we got to draw on, ain't it!" says I. "And it strikes me that since Pyramid put her name down he meant—— Let's see if there ain't something special she wants."

"Say," sings out Mrs. Shaw, "what about that will business? If it was old Gordon, I suppose he wouldn't leave me much. He had no call to."

"About what would you expect, now?" says I, as we drifts back to her.

She squints foxy at us for a minute. "After all this fuss," says she, "it ought to be two or three hundred—maybe five. No, I mean a thousand."

"Huh!" says I. "A thousand! Got your nerve with you, ain't you? But suppose it was that much, what would you do with it?"

"Do!" says she, her eyes brightenin'. "Why, I would—I—— Ah, what's the use! I'd make a fool of myself, of course. And inside of ten days I'd be in a D.T. ward somewhere."

"No old home or folks that you could go back to?" I suggests.

She shakes her head. "It's too late for me to go back," says she. "Too late!" She don't try to be tragic, don't even whine it out, but just states it dull and flat.

"But most everyone has a friend or so somewhere," says I.

At first that don't make any impression at all. Then all of a sudden she sits up and gazes vague over the top of my head.

"There's the Baron!" says she.

"The which?" says I.

"Von Blatzer," says she. "Oh, he's a real Baron, all right; an odd-looking, dried up little chap with a wig and painted eyebrows. Yet he's hardly sixty. I got to know him at Atlantic City, where I had a Board Walk pitch one season. Queer? That's no word for it! Shy and lonesome he was; but after you got to know him, one of the brightest, jolliest old duffers. Our first talk was out on the end of one of those long piers, by moonlight.

"After that it was a regular thing. We'd walk up and down like two kids, telling each other all about ourselves. I'd never stated my full opinion of Fletcher Shaw to a soul before; but somehow old Von was so friendly and sympathetic that I cut loose. The Baron ground his teeth over it. He said that Fletcher should have been caught young and shot from a cannon. Good old Von Blatzer! Wanted me to go back to Vienna as the Baroness. Think of it—me! But I was having a good season. Besides, I didn't think I could stand for a wig. I didn't know how much I was going to miss him."

"You wouldn't shy at the wig now, eh?" says I.

"Would I?" says she. "Honest, I liked Von Blatzer, for all his freaky ways. He was human, he was, and we understood each other. He'll be at Monte Carlo now. Roulette, you know. That's all he lives for. Plays a system. Nice little income he has; not big, but comfortable. And during the season he feeds it all into the wheel. Someone ought to cure him of that."

"Think you could, I expect?" says I. "But how about you and the juniper juice?"

"Oh, I could quit that easy if there was anything else to do," says she. "But there isn't."

"Then here's a proposition," says I. "You query him by cable to see if he's changed his mind; and if he's still a candidate for matrimony—well, I guess Mr. Steele will see that you get to the Baron."

"You—you mean that?" says she gaspy.

"Uh-huh," says I. "It's up to you."

"But—but I—— Why, look at me!" says she.

"Two weeks on the water wagon, a few visits to the beauty parlors, and an outfit of tango skirts ought to make some diff'rence, hadn't it?" says I. "Those items would be included. What do you say?"

I expect it was a good deal of a proposition to spring on a female party. No wonder she choked up over it.

"If I thought you were just guying me," says she, "I—I'd——"

"Here's a cable blank," says I. "Frame up your call to the Baron while I state the case to Mr. Steele."

He couldn't see it at all, J. Bayard couldn't. "What!" says he. "Waste all that money on such a wretch! Why, the woman is unworthy of even the most——"

"What's that got to do with it?" says I. "Pyramid didn't put that in the bill of partic'lars, did he? Maybe he had doubts about himself. And how would we qualify? How would you? Come, what's your battin' average, Steele, in the worthy league?"

J. Bayard squirms a little at that, and then hunches his shoulders. "Oh, if you're going to put it that way," says he, "go ahead. But when she starts to be a Baroness, I'd like to see her."

"You'll be there to hand her the tickets," says I. "You'll get her ready. That's part of your job."

He saw the point. And, say, he did his work thorough. I saw no more of Mrs. Shaw until nearly two weeks later, when Steele towed me down to the steamer.

"Which one?" says I, lookin' at the crowd along the rail. "Ah, come off! That with the veils and the stunnin' figure—the one wavin' this way? That ain't never Mrs. Fletcher Shaw!"

"That's Josie," says he. "And before the end of the month she'll be the Baroness Von Blatzer. Changed? Why, I hardly recognized her myself after her first day's shopping! She must have been quite a beauty once. But what a wreck she was when——"

"When she chased you with the broom, eh?" says I, chucklin'. "And now you're as chesty over her as though you'd been workin' a miracle. Just beamin' for joy, you are!"

"I know," says he. "And really, McCabe, I've never had a hand in anything which has given me so much genuine pleasure. It—it's weird, you know. I can't think what's happening to me."

"Maybe," says I, "you're sproutin' a soul."



CHAPTER VI

HOW MILLIE SHOOK THE JINX

Kind of odd the way the Morans and Elisha Porter Bayne coincided. You'd think so if you could see 'em bunched once; for Elisha P. is a mighty fine man; you know, one of our most prominent and highly respected citizens. Everybody says so. The local weekly always prints it that way. Besides, he's president of the Trust Company, head of the Buildin' and Loan, chairman of the School Board, and a director of such things as the Old Ladies' Home, the Hospital, and the Nut and Bolt Works. Always wears a black frock coat and a white string tie too,—tall, thin jawed, distinguished lookin' gent.

While the Morans—say, let's put them off as long as we can. And the more we linger in the society of Mr. Bayne the better we ought to be. Up to last spring, I blush to admit, I'd never been favored much. Course, commutin' in and out the way I do, I didn't have a good show. But we passes the nod when we meets. Elisha P. never strains his neck durin' the exercise. You could detect his nod with the naked eye, though, and I expect that was a good deal from him to me. You get the idea. That nod includes only the Mr. McCabe that owns a shore-front place and votes in Rockhurst-on-the-Sound. It don't stretch so far as to take in Shorty McCabe who runs a Physical Culture Studio on 42d-st. And that's all right too. I'm satisfied.

Then here one day back in April, as I'm drivin' home from the station with Sadie, who should step to the curb and hold me up but Mr. Bayne. Does it offhand, friendly, mind you. Course I stops sudden. Sadie bows and smiles. I lifts my lid. Mr. Bayne holds his square-topped derby against his white shirt front. We shakes hands cordial. And I'm most gaspin' for breath when it's over.

"Ah, by the way, Mr. McCabe," says he, "about that—er—Sucker Brook tract? Have you thought it over yet?"

Just like that, you know; as if it was something we'd been talkin' about for months, while as a matter of fact this is the first hint I'd had that Elisha P. was interested at all.

Not that it hadn't been put up to me. Why, three diff'rent parties had interviewed me confidential on the proposition, offerin' to let me in on the ground floor, and givin' as many diff'rent but more or less convincin' reasons for bein' so generous. One explains how he wanted to see the tract go to some local man instead of New York speculators; another confesses that their little syndicate is swingin' too much undeveloped property and has got to start a bargain counter; while the third man slaps me hearty on the back and whispers that he just wants to put me next to a good thing.

I come near swallowin' the bait too; for I'd turned over some Bronx buildin' lots not long before at a nice little advance, and the kale was only drawin' three per cent. Course this Sucker Brook chunk ain't much to look at, a strip of marshy ground along the railroad; but half a mile away they're sellin' villa plots, and acreage is mighty scarce so near the city line as we are. Took me a week of scoutin' among my friends to discover that this gang of real estate philanthropists had bought up the Sucker Brook tract on a private tip that a trolley extension was goin' to be put through there. So it might have been too, only a couple of the County Board members who was tryin' to pull off another deal got busy and blocked the franchise. Then it was a case of unload, with me runnin' as favorite in the Easy Mark Handicap. And now here comes Elisha P., straight out of the Trust Company, to spring the trapdoor himself.

"Why, yes, Mr. Bayne," says I. "I've chewed it over some; but I ain't quite made up my mind to take it on."

"You haven't!" says he, his nice, white, respectable eyebrows showin' great surprise. "But, my dear man, I personally had that offer made to you. Why, we could have—— But never mind that. I hope you may see fit to give us your answer by Saturday noon."

"That depends," says I, "on whether you come for it or not."

"I beg pardon?" says he, starin'.

"At the studio," says I, shovin' over one of my professional cards. "That's where I do business. So long, Mr. Bayne." And with that I throws in the clutch and leaves him gawpin'!

"Why, Shorty!" says Sadie. "How horrid of you! And Mr. Bayne is such a nice old gentleman too!"

"Yes, ain't he?" says I. "And for smoothness he's got a greased plank lookin' like a graveled walk."

I didn't think he'd come after that. But the other lines they had out must have been hauled in empty; for not ten days later I has a 'phone call from him sayin' he's in town and that if it's convenient he'll drop around about three P.M.

"I'll be here," says I.

"And I trust," he adds, "that I—er—may not encounter any pugilists or—er——"

"You'll be safe," says I, "unless some of my Wall Street customers break office rules and try to ring you in on a margin deal. Outside of them, or now and then a railroad president, the studio has a quiet, refined patronage."

"Ah, thanks," says he.

"Swifty," says I to my assistant, "don't show yourself in the front office after three to-day. I'm goin' to entertain a pillar of society, and a sight of that mug of yours might get him divin' through the window."

"Ahr-r-r-r chee!" remarks Swifty Joe, catchin' the wink.

Course, I might have got real peevish over Mr. Bayne's suspicions, and told him to go chase himself; but I'm feelin' sort of good-humored that day. Besides, thinks I, it won't do any harm to show him just how peaceful and respectable a physical culture studio can be. You know the ideas some people get. And as a rule our floor here is the quietest in the buildin'. I knew it would be that day specially; for all we had on the slate was a couple of poddy old parties who'd be workin' away at the apparatus, havin' about as strenuous a time as a baby playin' with its toes.

But I hadn't counted in that Sieger & Bloom combination, up on the fourth. They run a third-rate theatrical agency, you know, and just about then they was fillin' out contracts for summer snaps, and what you saw driftin' up and down the stairs didn't make you yearn to be a vaudeville actor. So later on, when I heard an argument in progress out in the hall, I glances nervous at the clock. It's almost on the tick of three.

"Hey, cut out the riot!" I calls through the transom; but as there's no letup to the debate I strolls over to the door, prepared to reprove someone real severe.

It's quite some spirited scene out on the landin'. There's old man Bloom, a short, squatty, fish-eyed old pirate with a complexion like sour dough. He has one foot on the next flight, and seems to be retreatin' as he waves his pudgy hands and sputters. Followin' him up is a tall, willowy, black-eyed young woman in a giddy Longchamps creation direct from Canal-st. She's pleadin' earnest that Bloom mustn't forget he's talkin' to a lady. Behind her is a husky, red-haired young gent with his fingers bunched menacin'; while just below, hesitatin' whether to push through the hostilities or beat it back to the street, is Elisha P. Bayne, Esq.

"Give us a show to make good, that's all we ask," the young woman is sayin'. "Put us on somewhere, as you said you would when you took our money."

"Bah!" snorts old Bloom. "I vouldn't sign you for a Third-ave. cabaret. Your act is rotten. A pair of cheab skaters, you are—cheab skaters!"

"Oh, we are, are we?" explodes the young woman. Then, biff! out flashes one of her long arms, and the next thing Bloom knows his silk lid has been smashed down over his eyes.

"Helb! Helb!" he squeals. "Bolice! I vill ged the bolice after you." With that he makes a break past her and goes waddlin' downstairs on the run.

"Now I've done it, I reckon," says the young woman. "And that about finishes us, Timothy dear. He's after a cop."

"Yes, and he'll bring one back," I puts in, "or I don't know Abie Bloom. About five and costs will be the bill. But it ought to be worth it."

"It would, every cent," says she, "if we had the five."

"In that case," says I, "you'd better do a sudden duck."

"But where to!" says she, glancin' desperate down the stairs.

And, say, the thought of how comic old Bloom looked strugglin' out of his hat, and of how eager he'd be to get her sent to the Island for it, was too much for me.

"In here," says I, steppin' out of the studio door. "You too," and I motions to the red-haired gent. Then, turnin' to Elisha P., I goes on, "Better join the group, Mr. Bayne."

"But, you know," he protests, "this is the very thing I wished to avoid. I do not care to mingle with such—er——"

"I expect not," says I; "but if you stay here you'll be gathered in as a witness to the assault. Course, if you'd rather do that—why——"

"No, no!" says he. "I—I think I will step in, for a moment at least."

He made up his mind just in time; for I'd no sooner herded the bunch into the front office and locked the door than we hears Bloom towin' the cop up the stairs and describin' puffy how he'd been most murdered. We listens while they searches the hallways clear to the top, and then hears the cop trampin' down again. He calls back to Bloom that he'll keep an eye out for the female assaulter.

"That's Roundsman Foley," says I, "and he's got a four-mile beat to cover between now and five o'clock. Inside of twenty minutes he'll be blocks away. Might as well sit down, Folks."

"Say, Mister," speaks up the young woman, "I don't know who you are, but we're much obliged. Tim, speak up."

Timothy wanted to; but he ain't an easy converser, and the language seems to clog his tongue.

"Don't mention it," says I. "I ain't got any personal grudge against Mr. Bloom; but I've been achin' to see someone hand him a pat, just for greens. There's my name on the door."

"Oh!" says the young woman. "Then you're Professor McCabe? Well, we're the Morans, Millie and Tim. Tango is our line."

I can see Elisha P. shudder visible at that. He hesitates a second, and then comes to the front. "McCabe," says he, "I feel that I must protest. An assault was committed in your presence. As a law-abiding citizen it should be your duty to turn the offender over to the authorities instead of furnishing a hiding place."

"Now listen to that!" says I. "All right, Mr. Bayne, if you insist. But you go along as a witness too."

"In a police court!" he gasps. "Why—really, you know, I—I couldn't do such a thing."

"Case quashed then," says I. "I'm too bashful to go alone."

"But you know," says he, "I came here merely on a matter of business."

"Yes, we'll get to that pretty soon," says I. "Our friends here are only goin' to stop until the travelin' is safer." Then I turns to the Morans. "Dancers, eh!" says I. "Where have you been on?"

"Nowhere," says Millie. "We're tryin' to break in."

"Oh!" says I. "Candidates for amateur night?"

"Not much!" says Millie. "We're as good as any. Maurice ain't got a thing on us, honest; nor that Ripple combination, either. Why, we got steps of our own that the rest haven't thought of!"

"Ye-e-es?" says I.

"Oh, I know," says she, shruggin' her shoulders. "Maybe we don't look it; but, say, we've got the goods."

"Case of undiscovered genius, eh?" says I.

Millie flushes a little at that; but bites her lips to keep back the hot retort. Bright lookin' girl, Millie; and if she hadn't been costumed so vivid she wouldn't have been such a bad looker. But in that tight, striped dress with the slashed skirt, and that foolish lid with the two skimpy pink feathers curlin' over the back—well, believe me, she was some zippy!

"Say, lemme tell you how it happened, won't you?" says she.

"If it ain't too long," says I.

"I'll make it sketchy," says she. "In the first place, when I landed here in New York about a year and a half ago, I'd made up my mind to connect with big money. I didn't know exactly how; the stage, maybe. Anyway, I knew the coin was here, and that it wasn't in Saskatoon."

"Sass—which?" says I.

"Saskatoon," says she. "It's on the map, up in Saskatchewan, you know. No, I wasn't born there. Hardly anybody was. It's too new. I went there with Mother and Brother Phil when the Northwest boom first started. It was all right for Philip. He could do surveying, and then he got to dipping into real estate. But there was no chance for me; so I started for the white lights. While I was looking around here I took on anything that would furnish a meal ticket. Oh, you can't starve Millie! I did fancy ironin' in a hand laundry, was window demonstrator for an electric vibrator concern, did a turn as a dress model, and sold soda checks in a drugstore. They don't load you down on payday in any of them places; but that didn't worry me. I was sizing up the good things, and I'd about decided on the front row of a musical comedy for mine, when what did I have to go and do but get soft on Tim here!"

Tim blushes embarrassed and scrapes his hoof.

"Enough to wreck most any career, wasn't it?" goes on Millie. "Think of it! Me, who'd come down to New York with my head so full of ambitions there wasn't any room to catch cold, and then in a little over a year to go and marry the first good-natured Irishman that asked me! You see, I'm only half Irish myself,—Mother was Argentine Spanish,—which makes me so different from Tim. Look at him! Would you dream he had a bit of sense? But he's—oh, he's Tim, that's all. And not many of 'em come better. Driving a motor truck, he was, and satisfied at that. It was up at a Terrace Garden dance we got acquainted. No music at all in his head; but in his feet—say, he just naturally has to let his toes follow the tune, and if ragtime hadn't been invented he'd have walked slow all his life. And me? Well, I ought to dance, with Father a born fiddler, and Mother brought up with castanets in her hands. We danced twelve of the fourteen numbers together that night, and I never even noticed he had red hair. I'd been dying to dance for months. Some partner, Tim was too. That began it. We joined a class and started learning the new steps. And almost before I knew it I was Mrs. Moran. We'd been married nearly a month before I woke up to what a fool thing I'd done. There I was, tryin' to feed and clothe two people, besides payin' the rent and furniture installments, all on sixteen per. I got a job as cashier in a quick lunch place next day. Tim didn't like it a bit; did you, Tim?"

Mr. Moran grins good-natured.

"That's the way he stormed around at home," says Millie. "But I had a scheme. We'd seen some of this dancing done on the stage, not much better than we could do ourselves. 'Tim dear,' says I, 'we've been dancing for the fun of it. It's the best thing you do. Now let's make it pay.' He thought I was crazy. I believe he had an idea he was born to drive a gasoline truck, and that it would be wicked to try anything else. But I do the heavy thinking for the Moran family. I nearly starved him until I'd saved out a tenspot. Then I went to the best tango professor I could find and took an hour lesson. Next I taught Tim. We cleared out our little dining room and had our meals off the gas range. My next splurge was a music machine and some dance records. One Saturday Tim brought home two dollars for overtime, and that night we watched Maurice from the second balcony. Then we really began practicing. Why, some nights I kept him at it for four hours on a stretch. He weighed one hundred and eighty at the start; but now he's down to one hundred and forty-three. But it's been good for him. And trying to keep all those new variations in his head—why, he's almost learned to think! Say, you know you can get almost anything by keeping at it. And Tim and I have learned rag dancing, all there is to it, besides some I've made up. All we need now is a chance, and it's such scum as old Bloom that keeps us out. Do you blame me for landing on his hat?"

"Not me," says I. "And I hope you break in sometime or other."

"It's got to be now," says Millie. "I've made Tim quit the truck, and we're down to our last dollar. Think of that! Just when I can see daylight ahead too! Why, if I knew where I could get hold of two hundred——"

She pauses and gazes around sort of desperate, until she and Elisha P. Bayne are starin' at each other.

I couldn't resist the temptation, either. "There you are," says I. "Mr. Bayne runs a bank. Lendin' money's his business."

"Really, McCabe!" says Bayne indignant.

But Millie ain't lettin' any hints get by. "Why wouldn't someone lend me that much?" says she, gazin' earnest at me once more. "Just two hundred! I could pay it back in less than six months. Oh, I'm sure I could! Mr. McCabe, wouldn't you?"

Almost took my breath away, the quick way she turned my josh back on me. "Why," says I, "I—I might—on security."

"Security?" says she, kind of vague. Then all of a sudden she brightens up. "Why, yes; of course you'd want security. I'd put up Tim."

"Eh?" says I, and something of the kind comes from Timothy too.

"He can always earn from twelve to fifteen a week," says Millie, eager. "You could have ten of it for twenty weeks. We could live in one room, and I would keep things running. Honest, if we don't make a go of it we'll come back and pay up."

"But what's the scheme?" says I. "Going off somewhere, are you?"

"That's what I want the money for, to take us there," says she. "I—I don't want to tell the rest. I haven't even told Tim. But we can win out. I'm sure we can if you'll stake us. Won't you, please, Professor MCCabe?"

And I expect it was all due to that sneer of Elisha P. Bayne's. For while this was about as batty a business proposition as I ever had put up to me, this scheme of Millie's for hockin' her hubby, I'd got more or less int'rested in her yarn. And it struck me that a girl who'd done what she had wa'n't any quitter. Elisha puts on such a hard, cold sneer too; and comin' from this wise, foxy old near-plute who'd been playin' lead pipe cinches all his life, I expect, and never lettin' go of a nickel until he had a dime's worth of goods in his fist—well, it got to me, all right.



"You win," says I, flashin' my roll and startin' to count off the twenties.

"But, McCabe!" gasps Elisha P. "Surely you're not going to lend two hundred dollars to—to such a person as this?"

"Yep," says I. "This is my foolish day. And I'm goin' to write you a check for two hundred more for a six months' option on that Sucker Brook tract. Here you are, Mrs. Moran. Never mind the ticket for Tim. I'm takin' your word."

"Talk about miracles!" says Millie, countin' the money dazed.

"Bless you, Sorr!" says Tim husky as I shows 'em out.

And I finds Elisha P. sittin' there rubbin' his hands expectant. He must have suspicioned I was easy all the while, or he wouldn't have hung on so; but after this exhibition I expect he felt it was only a matter of makin' a few passes and then walkin' off with everything but my shirt. Fact is, though, I'd had some new dope on this property, and while it looked like a thirty-to-one shot I thought I'd take a chance. Course, he tries to close the deal outright; but the option is as far as I'll go.

For weeks after that, though, I carried four hundred on the books with a minus sign in front. Then I crossed it off altogether. Not a word from the Morans. Nothing doing in the way of buying booms around Sucker Brook. But you got to stand some losses now and then if you're goin' to keep in line for an occasional big cleanup. And, anyway, it was worth while to head Elisha P. Bayne's boob list. You ought to see the sarcastic smiles he used to shoot over when we'd meet and he'd ask if I'd heard from, my dancing friends yet. Say, I expect I furnished the one joke of his life.

I did bank on gettin' back something from Millie, though, if only a money order for ten on account. But all through June and July, clear into August, not a whisper. Whatever her scheme had been, it must have gone wrong.

And then here one mornin' last week as I'm gazin' idle out the front window onto 42d-st., up rolls a taxi, and out climbs a couple that you might have said had been shot over by aeroplane from the Rue de Rivoli. Couldn't tell that so much from her getup as from the Frenchy hat and boulevard whiskers he's sportin'. First brick red imperial I ever remember seein' too. It ain't until they've climbed the stairs and walked in the studio door, though, that I even had a glimmer as to who they was. But one glance at them black eyes of the lady's was enough.

"Well, I'll be singed!" says I. "The Morans!"

"Of London and Paris," adds Millie.

"Gwan!" says I.

"Show him, Tim," says she. At which Timothy extracts from the inside of his silk tile a billboard poster announcing the comin', for a limited engagement only, of those European tango wizards, Mons. and Mlle. Moran.

"I cabled our agents we wouldn't sail until we'd seen a sample of the paper," says Millie.

"Gee!" says I. "You must have got next!"

"Did we?" says Millie. "My word! Why, when we hit London the craze was just striking in over there. We was among the advance guard. Say, we hadn't been over ten days before we headed the bill at the Alcazar as the famous New York tango artists. Inside of two weeks more we were doing three turns a night, with all kinds of private dates on the side. Say, would you believe it? I've danced with a real Duke! And Tim—why if it hadn't been for me on the spot there'd been no telling what would have happened. Those English society women are the limit. Then Paris. Ah, ma chere Paris! Say, I'm a bear for Paris. Didn't we soak the price on when that Moulin Rouge guy came after us, though? Ma foi! Say, he used to weep when be paid me the money. 'Mon Dieu! Five hundred francs for so small a danse!' But he paid. Trust Millie Moran! Say, I collected a few glad rags over there too. What about this one?"

"It don't need any Paris label," says I. "Don't see how you got upstairs in it, though."

"I can do a cartwheel in it," says she. "We've learned to handle ourselves some, Tim and I. And now I guess I'll take him out of hock. You'll find two hundred gold in the package."

"Thanks," says I, openin' the long envelope. "But what's this other?"

"Oh, that!" says she. "Interest. Deed for a few lots in the new North Addition to Saskatoon."

"Tut, tut!" says I. "I can't take 'em. That wa'n't any loan I staked you to; just bread on the waters."

"Well, you can't kick if it comes back a ham sandwich," says she. "Besides, the lots stand in your name now. They were a mile out of town when I bought 'em; but Brother Phil says the city's bulged that way since. They've got the boom, you know. That's where we've been sending all our spare salary. Phil's down here to see us open."

"Eh?" says I. "Not the surveyor!"

"He still does some of that," says she.

"Do you suppose," says I, "I could get him to do a little stunt for me while he's here?"

"Do I?" says she. "Why, he knows all about it. Brother Phil will go the limit for you."

Uh-huh. Philip was up to all the fine points of the game, and the imitation he gave of layin' out a two-million-dollar factory site along Sucker Brook was perfect, even to loadin' his transit and target jugglers into a tourin' car right in front of the Rockhurst Trust Company.

Maybe that's how it come to be noised around that the Western Electric Company was goin' to locate a big plant on the tract. Anyway, before night I had three of the syndicate biddin' against each other confidential; but when Elisha P. runs it up to four figures, offerin' to meet me at the station with a certified check, I closes the deal with a bang.

"Swifty," says I, hangin' up the 'phone, "trot around to the Casino and get a lower box for to-night, while I find a florist's and order an eight-foot horseshoe of American beauties."

"Chee!" says Swifty, gawpin'. "What's doin'?"

"I'm tryin' to celebrate a doubleheader," says I.



CHAPTER VII

REVERSE ENGLISH ON SONNY BOY

"Do you know, Shorty," says J. Bayard Steele, balancin' his bamboo walkin' stick thoughtful on one forefinger, "I'm getting to be a regular expert in altruism."

"Can't you take something for it?" says I.

But he waves aside my comedy stab and proceeds, chesty and serious, "Really, I am, though. It's this philanthropic executor work that I've been dragged into doing by that whimsical will of your friend, the late Pyramid Gordon, of course. I must admit that at first it came a little awkward, not being used to thinking much about others; but now—why, I'm getting so I can tell almost at a glance what people want and how to help them!"

"Huh!" says I. "Then you're some wizard. It often bothers me to dope out just what I need myself; and when it comes to decidin' for other folks—— Say, have you tackled envelope No. 4 on Pyramid's list yet?"

"I have," says J. Bayard, smilin' confident. "Peculiar case too. A month or so ago I should have been puzzled. Now it seems very simple. I've done all my investigating, made my plans, and if you will run downtown to a lawyer's office with me after luncheon we shall meet the beneficiaries-to-be and fix up the details of a nice little deed of kindness of which I am the proud author."

"Fat commission in it for you, eh?" says I.

J. Bayard looks pained and hurt. "Really," says he, "I hadn't thought of that. No, the outlay will be slight. In fact, it's merely a matter of launching a young man in society."

"Well, well!" says I. "That's a husky job for a couple of grown men like us, ain't it? Who's the young gent—Clarence what?"

"Ever hear of Hungry Jim Hammond?" says he.

I had, but couldn't quite place him; so J. Bayard supplies the description. He'd started out as a railroad man, Hammond had, back in the days when Pyramid Gordon was first beginnin' to discover that swappin' hot air for votin' shares was perfectly good business so long as you could get away with the goods. Only Hammond was the real thing. He was a construction expert.

Mr. Gordon had found him on the payroll of a line he'd annexed by a midnight deal; concluded he knew too much about the job to be a safe man to have around; so he transfers him to the Far West and sets him to work on a scheme to lay out a road parallelin' the Southern Pacific. Hammond couldn't tell it was a stall. He blazes merrily ahead surveyin' a right of way across three States, and had got as far as Death Valley when the rumor comes to camp that this new line is all a fake.

Hammond had a gang of twenty-five or thirty men with him, and his weekly pay check hadn't shown up for about a month. But he couldn't believe that Pyramid had laid down on him. He'd got mighty int'rested in buildin' that road across the desert, and had dreamed some rosy dreams about it. But his men felt diff'rent. They wanted action on the cashier's part, or they'd quit. Hammond begged 'em to stay. He even blew in his own bank account settlin' part of the back wages. But inside of three days his crew had dwindled to a Chinese cook and a Greaser mule driver. Took him a couple of weeks more to get wise to the fact that he was stranded there in the sand, six miles from a water hole, with a few cases of canned beef and a sack of corn meal.

Even then he didn't give up for good. He made his way back to a stage station and sent through a wire to Pyramid askin' for instructions. More than a month he waited, with no word from Gordon. Seems that by then Pyramid was too busy with other things. He'd cashed in on his bluff and was sortin' a new hand. And maybe he wa'n't anxious to have Hammond come East again. Anyway, he let him shift.

That was when Hammond came so near starvin'. But he didn't—quite. For a year or more he managed to live somehow. Then one day he drove a team of boneyard mules into Blue Dog with a wagonload of stuff that the natives stared at. It was white, shiny stuff. Hammond said it was borax. He'd discovered a big deposit of it out there in the blisterin' sand. He was goin' to ship it back East and sell it. They thought he was nutty. He wasn't, though. On East they was usin' a lot of borax and demandin' more.

With a few thousand back of him Hammond might have got to be the Borax King right then; but as it was he held onto an interest big enough to make him quite a plute, and inside of a year he was located in Denver and earnin' his nickname of Hungry Jim. His desert appetite had stayed with him, you see, and such little whims as orderin' a three-inch tenderloin steak frescoed with a pound of mushrooms and swimmin' in the juice squeezed from a pair of canvasback ducks got to be a reg'lar thing for him.

It was there he met and married the husky built head waitress and moved into a double-breasted mansion up on Capitol Hill. Also he begun wearin' diamond shirtstuds and givin' wine dinners.

"But, like others of his kind," goes on J. Bayard, "his luck didn't last. Because he'd made one big strike, he thought he knew the mining game from top to bottom. He lost hundreds of thousands on wild ventures. His long drawn out suit against Pyramid was another expensive luxury; for in the end Gordon beat him.

"It was Hammond's big appetite that finished him off, though,—acute indigestion. So that is why Pyramid leaves us this item in his list: 'The widow or other survivor of James R. Hammond.' Well, I've found them both, Mrs. Hammond and her son Royce. I haven't actually seen either of 'em as yet; but I have located Mrs. Hammond's attorney and had several conferences with him. And what do you think? She won't take a dollar of Gordon's money for herself; nor will Royce directly. There's one thing, however, that she will probably not refuse,—any social assistance we may give to her son. That's her chief ambition, it seems,—to see Royce get into what she considers smart society. Well, what do you say, McCabe? Can't we help?"

"Depends a good deal on Royce," says I. "Course, if he's too raw a roughneck——"

"Precisely!" breaks in J. Bayard. "And as the son of such a man we must look for rather a crude youth, I suppose. But in order to carry out the terms of Gordon's will we must do some kind and generous act for these people. This seems to be our only chance. Now here is my plan."

And he's comin' on, J. Bayard is! He proposes that we use our combined pull with Mr. Twombley-Crane to land Royce—for one consecutive night, anyway—plunk in the middle of the younger set. He's leased a nice furnished cottage from one of the Meadowbrook bunch, not more'n a mile from the Twombley-Crane estate, got the promise of havin' the youngster's name put up at the Hunt Club for the summer privileges, and has arranged to have mother and son move in right in the height of the season.

"In time for the Twombley-Cranes' big costume ball?" I suggests.

"Nothing less," says he. "And if we could manage to have them invited to that—well, what more could a fond parent ask?"

"H-m-m-m!" says I, rubbin' my chin. "Might get ourselves disliked if we sprung a ringer on 'em that way. Course, if this Royce boy could be trained to pull a broad A now and then, and be drilled into doin' a maxixe that would pass, I might take a chance. Mrs. McCabe could get their names on the guest list, all right. But I'd have to have a peek at Sonny first."

You see, with an ex-waitress mother, and a Hungry Jim for a father, Royce might be too tough for anything but a Coney Island spiel-fest. In that case J. Bayard would have to dig up a new scheme. So we starts out to look 'em up.

Accordin' to schedule we should have found 'em both waitin' for us at the lawyer's, sittin' side by side and lookin' scared. But the boy that shows us into the reception room says how Mrs. Hammond is in the private office with the boss, and it looks like Sonny was late.

"I'll tell you," says I to J. Bayard. "You push in and interview Mother, while I stick around out here and wait for the other half of the sketch."

He agrees to that, and has disappeared behind the ground-glass door when I discovers this slick-haired young gent sittin' at a desk over by the window,—a buddin' law clerk, most likely. And by way of bein' sociable I remarks casual that I hear how McGraw is puttin' Tesreau on the mound again to-day against the Cubs.

That don't get much of a rise out of him. "Aw, rully!" says he.

"I expect you'll be hikin' out for the grandstand yourself pretty quick?" I goes on.

"No," says he, shruggin' his shoulders annoyed. "I take no interest in baseball; none whatever, I assure you."

"Excuse my mentionin' it, then," says I. "But just what is your line,—croquet?"

"My favorite recreation," says he, "is dawncing." And with that he turns away like he'd exhausted the subject.

But this gives me an idea. Maybe he could be hired to coach Royce.

"It's a thrillin' sport," says I. "And, by the way, there's a young chap due to show up here soon. I wonder if you've seen him around before,—young Hammond?"

"I beg pardon," says he, "but do you refer to Royce Hammond?"

"That's the guy," says I. "Kind of a husky young hick, eh?"

He stares at me cold and disapprovin'. "I am Royce Hammond!" says he.

You could have bought me for a yesterday's rain check. "Wha-a-at!" says I, gawpin'. "You—you are——"

Say, come to look him over close, I might have known he was no ten-a-week process server. He's costumed neat but expensive, and his lily-white hands are manicured to the last notch. Nice lookin' youth he is, with a good head on him and a fine pair of shoulders. And for conversation he uses the kind of near-English accent you hear along the Harvard Gold Coast. Cul-chaw? Why, it fairly dripped from Royce, like moisture from the ice water tank on a hot day!

"Excuse," says I. "I'm Professor McCabe, and I was only——"

"Oh, yes," says he, sighin' weary, "I understand. Something absurd about a will, isn't it? Mother is quite keen over it; and I wish she wouldn't, you know."

"Eh?" says I, a bit dizzy from tryin' to follow him.

"Oh, I've no doubt you mean well enough," he goes on; "but we cawn't accept favors from utter strangers—really, we cawn't. And besides, old Gordon was such a rotter!"

To relieve his feelin's he lights a cigarette and gives me the shoulder once more. I felt like I'd been slapped on the wrist and sent to stand in the corner.

"Maybe you'd like my apology in writin'?" says I. "Just point out a real dusty spot on the floor, and I'll grovel in it. But remember, Son, all we laid out to do, in our humble way, was to give you a boost. So don't be too hard on us."

He smiles patronizin' at that. "No offense intended, I'm suah," says he. "I merely wished to make clear my own position in this ridiculous affair. Of course, if Mother insists, I presume I must—— Bah Jove! Here they are, though!"

And out through the door comes J. Bayard and the lawyer, escortin' a stunnin'-built lady with her face half hid by veils. I'd been introduced too, and was just handin' her a chair, when we got a good square look at each other. So it was simultaneous. She gives a little gasp and stiffens, and I expect I did some open-face work myself. I glances from her to J. Bayard and stares foolish.

"Did you say Mrs. Hammond?" says I.

"Of course, McCabe," says he sort of peevish. "You know I explained beforehand."

"Yes," says I; "but—but——"

Then the lady steps to the front herself, her chin up and her lips pressed tight. "Professor McCabe and I have met before," says she, "under—well, under different circumstances. That is all. And now, Mr. Steele, you spoke of securing an invitation for my son and myself to an important social affair. At just whose house, please?"

"Why," says J. Bayard, "at Mr. Twombley-Crane's."

She don't wince. Near as I could tell she don't make a move, and a second later she's turned to me with a sketchy sort of a smile. "I think I may trust you to explain to Mr. Steele later on," says she, "how impossible it would be for me to accept such an invitation."

I nods, still gawpin' at her. You'd most thought that would have been hint enough for J. Bayard; but he's such a fathead at times, and he's so strong for carryin' through any proposition of his own, that it don't get to him.

"But, my dear lady," says he, "such an opportunity! Why, the Twombley-Cranes, you know, are——"

"Ah, ditch it, J. B.!" I cuts in, and shakes my head menacin'.

The lady smiles grateful and lifts one hand. "It's no use," says she. "I've given up. And you might as well know the whole story at once; Royce too. I didn't mean that he should ever know; but I see now that he is bound to hear it sooner or later. Professor McCabe, you tell them."

It's some attentive audience I faced too; J. Bayard starin' puzzled, the lawyer with his eyes squinted hard at her, and young Royce growin' pale around the gills. It was that look of his that hurried me on.

"Why, it ain't so much," says I; "only when I knew you you was housekeeper at the Twombley-Cranes, wa'n't you?"

"Mother!" says the young gent choky, jumpin' to his feet.

"I was," says she. "That was four years ago, when Royce was a freshman. Very glad I was to get the position too, and not a little pleased that I was able to fill it. Why? Because it gave me a chance to learn there the things I wanted to know; the things I needed to know, Royce, as your mother."

But he only gazes at her blank and shocked.

"Can't you understand, Royce?" she goes on pleadin'. "You know how we have moved from place to place; how at times my cards have read 'Mrs. James R. Hammond,' then 'Mrs. J. Royce Hammond,' and finally 'Mrs. Royce Hammond'? But it was all useless. Always someone came who knew, and after that—well, I was just the widow of Hungry Jim Hammond.

"Not that I cared for myself. I was never ashamed of Hungry Jim while he lived. He was a real man, Jim Hammond was, honest and kind and brave. And if he was crude and rough, it was only because he'd lived that way, because he'd had to. He let them call him Hungry Jim too. No one ever knew him to resent it. But it hurt, just the same. He tried to live it down, there in Denver, tried to be refined and polite; but those years in the desert couldn't be wiped out so easily. He was Hungry Jim to the last.

"He wanted his son to be different, though. 'Outfit him to travel with the best, Annie,' he used to say to me during those last days, 'and see that he gets on a polish. Promise, now!' I promised. And I've done as well as I could. I've lived for that. But I soon found that real refinement was something you couldn't order at the store. I found that before I could get it for Royce I must have at least a speaking acquaintance with it myself.

"That meant associating with nice people. But nice people didn't care to mix with Mrs. Jim Hammond. I didn't blame them for shutting their front doors to me. I had to get in, though. So I slipped in by the back way—as housekeeper. I kept my eyes and ears open. I picked up their little tricks of speech and manner, their ways of doing things. I toned my voice down, schooled myself, until I knew the things that Royce ought to know. It wasn't easy, especially the giving him up during his holidays and sending him off with his college friends, when I wanted him to be with me. Oh, how much I did miss him those two summers! But I had promised Jim, and—and—well, I think I've made of Royce what he wanted me to make of him."

Somehow or other, as she stops, we all turns towards young Hammond. His face ain't pale any more. It's well pinked up.

"By Jove!" says J. Bayard enthusiastic. "But that's what I call real pluck, Mrs. Hammond. And your son does you credit too. So what if the Twombley-Cranes might remember you as a former housekeeper? They don't know the young man, needn't know just who he is. Why not accept for him? Why not give him a chance? What do you say, McCabe?"

"Sure!" says I. "I'm backin' him to qualify."

"It might mean," goes on J. Bayard insinuatin', "an opportunity to—well, to meet the right girl, you know."

Mrs. Hammond draws in her breath sharp and clasps her hands tight. I could see the picture she was watchin' on the screen,—Royce and a real swell young lady plutess trippin' towards the altar; maybe a crest on the fam'ly note paper.

"Oh!" says she. "And he should have the chance, shouldn't he? Well then, he must go. And you can just leave me out."

That seemed to settle it, and we was all takin' a deep breath, when Royce steps to the center of the stage. He puts his arm gentle around Mrs. Hammond and pats her on the shoulder.

"Sorry, Mother," says he, "but I'm going to do nothing of the sort. You're an old dear, and the best mother a boy ever had. I never knew how much you had given up for me, never dreamed. But from now on it's going to be different. It's my turn now!"

"But—but, Royce," protests Mrs. Hammond, "you—you don't quite understand. We can't go on living as we have. Our income isn't so much as it was once, and——"

"I know," said Royce. "I had a talk with your attorney last week. It's the fault of that Honduras rubber plantation, where most of our funds are tied up. That Alvarez, your rascally Spanish superintendent, has been robbing you right and left. Well, I'm going to put a stop to that."

"You, Royce!" says Mother.

"Yes," says he quiet but earnest, "I'm going down there and fire him. I'm going to run the plantation myself for awhile."

"Why, Royce!" gasps Mrs. Hammond.

He smiles and pats her on the shoulder again. "I know," he goes on. "I seem useless enough. I've been trained to shine at dinner parties, and balls, and thes dansants. I suppose I can too. And I've learned to sound my final G's, and to use the right forks, and how to make a parting speech to my hostess. So you've kept your promise to Father. But I've been thinking it all over lately. That isn't the sort of person I want to be. You say Father was a real man. I want to be a real man too. I mean to try, anyway. This little affair with Alvarez ought to test me. They say he's rather a bad one, that he can't be fired. We'll see about that. There's a steamer for Belize next Thursday. I'm going to sail on her. Will you go along too?"

For a minute they stood there, Mother and Sonny boy, gazin' into each other's eyes without sayin' a word; and then—well, we turns our backs as they goes to a clinch and Mother turns on the sprinkler.

But J. Bayard's programme for helpin' Royce break into the younger set is bugged for fair. Instead we've dug up an expert in rubber farmin' and are preparin' to send him down as first assistant to the classiest plantation manager that ever started for Honduras. Mrs. Hammond announces that she's goin' too.

"There's good stuff in that young chap," says J. Bayard. "He isn't the son of Hungry Jim for nothing. I'll bet he wins out!"

"Win or lose," says I, "he's ducked bein' a parlor rat for life, which is something."



CHAPTER VIII

GUMMING GOPHER TO THE MAP

I'd heard the front office door pushed open and listened to a couple of heavy steps on the floor runner before I glances round to find this high party with the wide, stooped shoulders and the rugged face standin' there beamin' at me genial and folksy. In one hand he has a green cloth bag with somethin' square in it, and in the other he has a broad-brimmed soft hat about the color of Camembert cheese. A tank station delegate and no mistake!

"The Horse Dealers' Exchange is over east of Fourth avenue, about eight blocks down," says I.

He chuckles good-natured and shakes his head. "You got two more comin' to you, Brother," says he.

"Is it sawmill machinery you're lookin' for, then," says I, "or the home office of Marriage Bells?"

"Struck out!" says he. "Now it's my bat. Are you J. Bayard Steele, Mister?"

"Honest, now," says I, "do I look it?"

"Then I reckon you're the other one—Professor McCabe," says he.

"Line hit over center field!" says I. "What's the follow up to that?"

"No hurry," says he. "Have a button first."

"Eh?" says I, gawpin', as he tosses the green bag and yellow lid onto a chair, dives into his side pocket, and proceeds to pin something on my coat lapel.

"Plenty of 'em," says he. "Here, take some for your friends. How's that for a slogan, anyway? 'Go to Gopher!' Good advice too. Gopher's the garden spot of the universe."

"Gopher what—where is it?" says I.

"Why," says he, "Gopher, U.S.A. That's the idea! I'm from there. Hubbs is the name,—Nelson Hubbs, secretary of the Gopher Board of Trade,—and I never miss a chance to give Gopher a boost."

"If this is a sample," says I, "you don't need to make an affidavit. But you wanted to see J. Bayard Steele, didn't you?"

It was as I'd suspicioned. Mr. Hubbs was No. 5 on the kindly deeds list that Pyramid Gordon had wished on Steele and me. We was to apply soothin' acts and financial balm to all the old grouches that Pyramid had left behind him, you remember, on a commission basis.

Seems J. Bayard had been tracin' Hubbs up by mail for more'n a month, and at that it was just by chance one of his letters had been forwarded to the right place. So Hubbs had come on to see what it was all about.

"Course," says he, "I remember this Gordon; but I didn't think he would me, and I can't see how settlin' up his will could——"

"Threw the hooks into you sometime or other, didn't he?" says I.

"I dun'no's you'd rightly call it that, either," says Hubbs, runnin' his long fingers reflective through his heavy mop of wavy hair. "I was station agent and dispatcher out at Kayuse Creek the only time we met up—and of all the forsaken, dreary, one-mule towns along the line that was the worst. I'd been there a year and a half, with no signs of ever gettin' out, and I'd got so I hated every human, being in sight, includin' myself. I even hated the people in the trains that went through, because they was goin' somewhere, and I wasn't. You know how it is."

"Well?" says I.

"So when this special pulled in, two private cars and a blind baggage," he goes on, "and a potty conductor asked me for a clear track to Omaha, I turned him down flat. Might of done it, you know, for the express was four hours behind schedule; but I was just too ornery. I let on I hadn't got the order, made 'em back their old special on a siding, and held 'em there all one blisterin' hot afternoon, while they come in by turns and cussed me. But your Mr. Gordon was the only one that talked straight to the point. 'Let us through, or I'll see that you're fired before morning!' says he, and fired I was. The night freight dropped a new agent, and by breakfast time I was a wanderer on the face of the earth. Which was the best thing, Sir, that ever happened to me! I might have stuck in Kayuse Creek until this day."

"How long was it until you discovered this Gopher spot?" says I. "Near a dozen years," says he, "and during that time, Sir, I've had a whirl at more different kinds of industry than you'd believe existed, from runnin' a self-binder to canvassin' for the Life of James A. Garfield. It was Possum Oil that brought me good luck. Boiled linseed with camphor and a little tincture of iron was what it was really made of; but there was a 'possum picture on the label, and I've had testimonials provin' that it has cured nearly every disease known to man, from ringworm to curvature of the spine. I'd worked up a fifteen-minute spiel too that was a gem of street corner eloquence, and no matter where I stuck up my flare I could do an evenin's business runnin' from ten to forty dollars.

"So when I hit them corn fritters of Mrs. Whipple's that night in Gopher I had no more notion of quittin' the road than a prairie chicken has of breakin' into a hencoop. But say, Brother, no human being ever made tastier corn fritters than them. 'Young lady,' says I to the half-grown girl that waited on table, 'who built these?'—'Mrs. Whipple,' says she. 'Present my best compliments to her,' says I, 'and tell me where I can find Mr. Whipple. I want to congratulate him.'—'Lawzee! Whipple?' says she. 'Why, he died back East goin' on six years ago.'—'Then,' says I, 'I'll take the message to Mrs. Whipple myself. She's, around, I suppose?'—'No,' says the girl. 'Soon's she got supper ready she had to go down to the square 'lectioneerin'. She's runnin' for Mayor.'

"Say, Professor McCabe, it was a fact! Besides conductin' her boardin' house and bein' president of the Civic League, she was candidate for Mayor on an independent ticket. Got it too, Sir! They have the vote out in our State, you know.

"Well, hearin' that sort of cooled me down a bit. I thought she'd be a hatchet-faced female with a voice like a guinea hen. So I didn't, see her until I was all packed up to leave next day and hunted her up to pay my bill. And say, Brother, doggoned if she don't turn out to be about the plumpest, cheeriest, winningest little body that ever I see unclaimed! Nothin' standoffish about her, either. 'There!' says she. 'Look at you, going off with all that dandruff on your coat collar! Mamie, bring me that whisk broom.'—'Ma'am,' says I, when she'd finished the job and added a little pat to my necktie, 'my name is Hubbs. It's a homely name, and I'm a homely man; but if there's any chance of ever persuadin' you to be Mrs. Nelson Hubbs, I'll stick around this town until the crack of doom.'—'Now don't be foolish,' says she. 'Run along. I'm busy.' Wa'n't so encouragin', was it? 'Let's see,' says I, 'what place is this anyhow?'—'The idea!' says she. 'It's Gopher; and let me tell you, Mr. Hubbs, some day it's going to be one of the finest cities west of Chicago!'—'While you're in it,' says I, 'it's goin' to be good enough for me. I'm goin' to stay right here.'

"Well, that's what I did, Sir. The Gopher Gazette was for sale, and inside of twenty-four hours I'd bought it, one-third cash, and I've been runnin' it ever since. And I've proposed to Mrs. Whipple once a week reg'lar the whole ten months."

"Only to get more of that run-along-now advice?" says I.

He winks rapid two or three times by way of relievin' his feelin's. "It ain't exactly as bad as that," says he. "I reckon she's kind of got used to my homely face, and if I have any good points at all, you can bet she's found 'em. Anyway, one night a couple of months ago she dropped a hint that was like manna from the sky. I've been livin' on it ever since. 'Nelson,' says she, 'there's only one man I'd have, and that's the man who will put Gopher on the map.'"

"Oh-ho!" says I. "Hence the buttons?"

"That's only part of my scheme," says Hubbs. "The rest I worked out between the time I got word from this Mr. Steele and the day I left for New York. Up to then I hadn't thought of comin' East to boost Gopher; but the letter settled me. 'I'm goin' on,' says I to Mrs. Whipple, 'and if Gopher ain't on the map when I come back, I'll never ask you again to change your name to Hubbs. I'll change mine to Dubb!' So you see, Professor, I ain't got any time to waste. Where can I find Mr. Steele?"

I gave him directions for locatin' J. Bayard, and off he pikes, swingin' the green bag jaunty in one big paw. He'd been here ten minutes, and he'd told me the story of his life. Now see what Steele gets out of him.

"Shorty," says J. Bayard, driftin' in languid after lunch and caressin' his bank president whiskers approvin' as he camps down by the desk, "the deeper I get into the career of your late friend, Pyramid Gordon, the more I am amazed at the infinite pains he took to deal unjustly with so many different persons of no account."

"All of which means, I expect," says I, "that you've been havin' a talk with Hubbs. Well, what you goin' to do for him?"

Mr. Steele shrugs his shoulders. "He is simply impossible!" says he.

"How's that?" says I.

"I was unable to decide," says J. Bayard, "whether he was mentally unbalanced, or just plain crank. Comes from some absurd little hole out West, and has but one idea in his head,—to boom that place. Tried to pin a beastly button on me. Ah! I see you have one."

"Sure!" says I. "'Go to Gopher!' Catchy, ain't it?"

"Bah!" says he. "What do I care for his little two-by-four village? What does anyone care, save the poor wretches who must live there? And yet he insisted on boring me for one mortal hour with his preposterous schemes. It appears that he has raised an advertising fund of a thousand dollars, and means to open a publicity bureau somewhere downtown."

"Well, that's enterprisin', ain't it?" says I.

"It's imbecile!" says J. Bayard. "What can he do with a thousand in New York. You might as well try to sprinkle Central Park with a quart watering can. I told him so. I tried to get out of him too some suggestion as to how we could best carry out the terms of Gordon's crazy will; some kind and generous act that we could do for him, you know. But he would talk of nothing but Gopher—everlastingly and eternally Gopher!"

"Yes," says I, "that's his long suit."

"And do you know what he thinks he's going to do?" goes on Steele. "Why, he's had the nerve to plot out a whole quarter-section around his infernal town, organized a realty company, and had half a million dollars' worth of Gopher Development shares printed! Thinks he's going to unload trash like that here in New York! Now what can I do for such a man?"

"Ain't that right in your line, though?" says I.

"It may have been at one time," admits J. Bayard; "but to-day you couldn't give away nickel chances on the national gold reserve. The market is dead. Even the curb brokers have fallen back on racing tin rolling toys and matching quarters."

Well, I couldn't dispute it. If anyone knows the phony finance game at all, it's J. Bayard Steele. And the best I could do was to get him to agree to sort of keep track of Hubbs and maybe, after he'd blown all his cash against this bloomin' stunt, step in and send him back to Gopher before he hit the bread line.

Must have been a week that I didn't hear from either of 'em, and then here the other afternoon J. Bayard calls up on the 'phone.

"Shorty," says he, "if you want to see our friend Hubbs reach the pinnacle of his folly, come down to Broad street right away. I'll meet you in front of the Hancock National!"

As there's no rush on at the studio just then I goes down.

"It's rich," says Steele. "Actually, that country clown is trying on, right here in New York, the same primitive methods that real estate boomers use in the soggy South and the woolly West. Would you believe it? Come have a look."

Well, say, it wa'n't easy gettin' near enough, at that. But we works our way through the mob until we're in front of the buildin', where there's a big, yellow-lettered sign that reads:

GOPHER, U.S.A. HEADQUARTERS

Underneath the sign was a big window with the sash out and a sort of platform juttin' over the sidewalk. Just as we arrives out steps Nelson Hubbs, wearin' the same rube rig and carryin' the same green bag. He looks just as big and homely and good-natured as ever.

"Friends," says he, sweepin' off the alfalfa lid with a flourish, "out in Gopher we always like to open up with a little music; and while I ain't no Caruso, or anything like that, I'm goin' to do my best."

A snicker runs through the crowd at that, turnin' to haw-haws as he proceeds to unlimber something from the green bag. It's an accordion, one of these push and pull organs. Believe me, though, he could sing some! Throwin' back his head and shakin' that heavy mop of hair, he roars out deep and strong the first advertisin' solo, I guess, that New York ever heard.

"Now, Friends, everybody in on the chorus!" he calls. "Every-body! Here she goes!

"Oh, I want to go to Gopher—Gopher— Oh, I want to go to Gopher—Gopher! The streets are straight, the sky is high, You'll strike it rich, and live on pie, You can't get sick, and you never die, In Gopher, U. S. A."

Did they join in? Say, it was a swingin' tune, the words was easy to follow, and the crowd was ready for anything. They simply cut loose, and by the time they'd done that chorus two or three times he had 'em right with him. Then he springs his business spiel.

Talk about your boost orations—say, that was a classic! He tells 'em confidential how Gopher is the comin' metropolis of the great West; how, "with its main boulevard laid out along the sinuous, lovely banks of the pellucid Pinto River, and its western boundaries stretching off to the sunset-tinted tops of Soup Kettle Range, it has a scenic setting unsurpassed anywhere this side of Switzerland." And when it comes to predictin' how prosperity has picked Gopher for its very own, he goes the limit. Next he tells 'em about the development company and the shares.

"Remember, Friends," says he, "every share means a front foot, and every front foot a fortune. Send in fifty shares, and we'll give you a deed to a city lot. First come first served, and the early bird laps up the cream. I don't urge you to buy 'em. I'm just giving you a chance to get in on the ground floor. And if you don't want to come in to-day, maybe you will to-morrow. Anyway, have a button. Wear it! Tell your friends about Gopher. Here you are! Every-body have a button!"

With that he scatters handful after handful broadcast into the crowd, which catches 'em eager. Even J. Bayard gets excited and grabs for one.

"By George, Shorty!" says he. "Hanged if there isn't the germ of a good idea in this scheme of his! Every share a front foot! And if he could only get the buying started——"

Steele is gazin' over the heads of the crowd absentminded. All of a sudden he breaks out again. "I have it!" says he. "I'll get that curb gang to fooling with Gopher."

But, foxy as he was, I don't believe J. Bayard knew just how big a bonfire he was touchin' off. I know I thought he was nutty when he wants me to O.K. his plan for buyin' a hundred shares to distribute free.

"Bait!" says he. "They'll bite! You watch 'em!"

Well, if you've been followin' the market close, you know what happened. I expect the first bids was made just as a josh. I hear that Gopher Development started at ten cents. Then someone sold a block at fifteen. By noon they'd gone to twenty. Durin' luncheon time a sporty bunch in a rathskeller cooked up the bright idea that it would be humorous to sell Gopher short and hammer the price down to five cents. Before three P.M. the gross transactions had run into the thousands.



I was in Hubbs' office when the first real money was paid over for Gopher. A hook-nosed young broker in a shepherd plaid suit and a pink felt hat rushes in and planks down twenty dollars for fifty shares at the market. Hubbs was just passin' 'em over too, when Steele interferes.

"Five more, please," says J. Bayard. "We are holding Gopher at 50."

"Wha'd'ye mean, fifty?" gasps the curb man. But he was short on a three-fifteen delivery, and he had to put up the extra five.

"Stick to that rule," Steele advises Hubbs. "Ask 'em ten points more than outside quotations."

What really got things goin', though, was when some of the stock clerks and bookkeepers, who'd heard and talked nothin' but Gopher these last two days, begun buyin' lots outright and turnin' 'em in for deeds. Whether or not they believed all Hubbs had fed 'em about Gopher don't matter. They was takin' a chance. So they slips out at noon and gives real orders. Course, they wa'n't plungin'; but the combined effect was the same.

And it don't take the curb long to get wise. "The suckers are buying Gopher," was the word passed round. Then maybe the quotations didn't jump! There wa'n't any quarter matchin' down in Broad street after that. They was too busy yellin' Gopher at each other. Up she went,—75, then 85, then 110, and when closin' hour come the third day it was the liveliest scene inside the ropes that the margin district had known in years.

I expect the newspapers helped a lot too. They had a heap of fun with Hubbs and his Gopher proposition,—Hubbs of Gopher, U.S.A. They printed pictures of him playin' the accordion, and interviews reproducin' his descriptive gems about "the banks of the pellucid Pinto," and such.

But you never can tell how a comedy stab is goin' to turn out. This game of buyin' real estate shares for a dollar or so, with the prospects that before night it might be worth twice as much, was one that hit 'em hard. By Friday Gopher stock was being advertised like Steel preferred, and the brokers was flooded with buyin' orders. Some of the big firms got into the game too. A fat German butcher came all the way down from the Bronx, counted out a thousand dollars in bills to Nelson Hubbs, and was satisfied to walk away with a deed for a hundred front feet of Gopher realty. He wasn't such a boob, either. Two hours later he could have closed out five hundred to the good.

It wa'n't like a stock flurry, where there's an inside gang manipulatin' the wires. All the guidin' hand there was in this deal was that of J. Bayard Steele, and he contents himself with eggin' Hubbs on to stand firm on that ten-cent raise.

"Not a penny more, not a penny less," says he, beamin'. "It'll get 'em."

And I don't know when I've seen him look more contented. As for Nelson Hubbs, he seems a little dazed at it all; but he keeps his head and smiles good-natured on everybody. Not until Gopher Development hits twenty-five dollars a share does he show any signs of gettin' restless.

"Boys," says he, bangin' his fist down on the desk, "it's great! I've turned that thousand-dollar fund into fifty, and as near as I can figure it property values along our Main street have been jumped about eight hundred per cent. They've heard of it out home, and they're just wild. I expect I ought to stay right here and push things; but—well, McCabe, maybe you can guess."

"No word from a certain party, eh?" says I.

Hubbs shakes his head and starts pacin' up and down in front of the window. He hadn't done more'n three laps, though, before in blows a messenger boy and hands him a telegram.

"We-e-e-yow!" yells Hubbs. "Hey, Shorty, it's come—doggoned if it ain't come! Look at that!"

It was a brief bulletin, but full of meat. It runs like this:

Good work, Nelson. You've done it. Gopher's on the map.

And the last we saw of him, after he'd turned the stock business over to Mendell & Co., he was pikin' for a west-bound train with his grip in one fist and that old accordion in the other.

J. Bayard smiles after him friendly and indulgent. "A woman in the case, I suppose?" says he.

"Uh-huh," says I. "The plumpest, cheeriest, winnin'est little body ever left unclaimed,—his description. She's the lady Mayor out there. And if I'm any judge, with them two holdin' it down, Gopher's on the map to stay."



CHAPTER IX

WHAT LINDY HAD UP HER SLEEVE

"But think of it, Shorty!" says Sadie. "What an existence!"

"There's plenty worse off than her," says I; "so what's the use?"

"I can't help it," says she. "Twenty years! No holidays, no home, no relatives: nothing but sew and mend, sew and mend—and for strangers, at that! Talk about dull gray lives—ugh!"

"Well, she's satisfied, ain't she?" says I.

"That's the worst of it," says Sadie. "She seems to live for her work. Goodness knows how early she's up and at it in the morning, and at night I have to drive her out of the sewing room!"

"And you kick at that?" says I. "Huh! Why, on lower Fifth-ave. they capitalize such habits and make 'em pay for fifteen-story buildin's. Strikes me this Lindy of yours is perfectly good sweatshop material. You don't know a good thing when you see it, Sadie."

"There, there, Shorty!" says she. "Don't try to be comic about it. There's nothing in the least funny about Lindy."

She was dead right too; and all I meant by my feeble little cracks was that a chronic case of acute industry was too rare a disease for me to diagnose offhand. Honest, it almost gave me the fidgets, havin' Lindy around the house. Say, she had the busy bee lookin' like a corner loafer with his hands in his pockets!

About once a month we had Lindy with us, for three or four days at a stretch, and durin' that time she'd be gallopin' through all kinds of work, from darnin' my socks or rippin' up an old skirt, to embroiderin' the fam'ly monogram on the comp'ny tablecloths; all for a dollar'n a half per, which I understand is under union rates. Course, Sadie always insists on throwin' in something for overtime; but winnin' the extra didn't seem to be Lindy's main object. She just wanted to keep goin', and if the work campaign wa'n't all planned out for her to cut loose on the minute she arrived, she'd most have a fit. Even insisted on havin' her meals served on the sewin' table, so she wouldn't lose any time. Sounds too good to be true, don't it? But remember this ain't a class I'm describin': it's just Lindy.

And of all the dried-up little old maids I ever see, Lindy was the queerest specimen. Seems she was well enough posted on the styles, and kept the run of whether sleeves was bein' worn full or tight, down over the knuckles or above the elbow, and all that; but her own costume was always the same,—a dingy brown dress that fits her like she'd cut it out in the dark and had put it together with her eyes shut,—a faded old brown coat with funny sleeves that had little humps over the shoulders, and a dusty black straw lid of no partic'lar shape, that sported a bunch of the saddest lookin' violets ever rescued from the ashheap.

Then she had such a weird way of glidin' around silent, and of shrinkin' into corners, and flattenin' herself against the wall whenever she met anyone. Meek and lowly? Say, every motion she made seemed to be sort of a dumb apology for existin' at all! And if she had to go through a room where I was, or pass me in the hall, she'd sort of duck her head, hold one hand over her mouth, and scuttle along like a mouse beatin' it for his hole.

You needn't think I'm pilin' on the agony, either. I couldn't exaggerate Lindy if I tried. And if you imagine it's cheerin' to have a human being as humble as all that around, you're mistaken. Kind of made me feel as if I was a slave driver crackin' the whip.

And there wa'n't any special reason that I could see for her actin' that way. Outside of her clothes, she wa'n't such a freak. That is, she wa'n't deformed, or anything like that. She wa'n't even wrinkled or gray haired; though how she kept from growin' that way I couldn't figure out. I put it down that her lonesome, old maid existence must have struck in and paralyzed her soul.

There was another queer quirk to her too. Work up as much sympathy as you wanted to, you couldn't do anything for her. Sadie ain't slow at that, you know. She got int'rested in her right off, and when she discovers how Lindy lives in a couple of cheap rooms down in the Bronx all by herself, and never goes anywhere or has any fun, she proceeds to spring her usual uplift methods. Wouldn't Lindy like a ticket to a nice concert? No, thanks, Lindy didn't care much about music. Or the theater? No, Lindy says she's afraid to go trapesin' around town after dark. Wouldn't she quit work for an hour or so and come for a spin in the car, just to get the air? Lindy puts her hand over her mouth and shakes her head. Automobiles made her nervous. She tried one once, and was so scared she couldn't work for two hours after. The subway trains were bad enough, goodness knows!

I couldn't begin to tell you all the things Lindy was afraid of,—crowds, the dark, of getting lost, of meetin' strangers, of tryin' anything new. I remember seein' her once, comin' out on the train. She's squeezed into the end seat behind the door, and was huddled up there, grippin' a little black travelin' bag in one hand and a rusty umbrella in the other, and keepin' her eyes on the floor, for all the world like she'd run away from somewhere and was stealin' a ride. Get it, do you?

But wait! There was one point where Lindy had it on most of us. She knew where she was goin'. Didn't seem to have any past worth speakin' about, except that she'd been born in England,—father used to keep a little store on some side street in Dover,—and she'd come over here alone when she was quite a girl. As for the present—well, I've been tryin' to give you a bird's-eye view of that.

But when it comes to the future Lindy was right there with the goods. Had it all mapped out for twenty years to come. Uh-huh! She told Sadie about it, ownin' up to bein' near forty, and said that when she was sixty she was goin' to get into an Old Ladies' Home. Some prospect—what? She'd even picked out the joint and had 'em put her name down. It would cost her three hundred and fifty dollars, which she had salted away in the savings bank already, and now she was just driftin' along until she could qualify in the age limit. Livin' just for that!

"Ah, can the gloom stuff, Sadie!" says I as she whispers this latest bulletin. "You give me the willies, you and your Lindy! Why, that old horse chestnut out there in the yard leads a more excitin' existence than that! It's preparin' to leaf out again next spring. But Lindy! Bah! Say, just havin' her in the house makes the air seem moldy. I'm goin' out and tramp around the grounds a bit before dinner."

That was a good hunch. It's a clear, crisp evenin' outside, with the last red of the sun just showin' in the northwest and a thin new moon hangin' over Long Island Sound off in the east, and in a couple of turns I shook off the whole business. I'd taken one circle and was roundin' the back of the garage, when I sees something dark slip into a tree shadow up near the house.

"That you, Dominick?" I sings out.

There's no answer to that, and, knowin' that if there's one failin' Dominick don't possess it's bein' tonguetied, I gets suspicious. Besides, a couple of porch-climbin' jobs had been pulled off in the neighborhood recent, and, even though I do carry a burglar policy, I ain't crazy about havin' strangers messin' through the bureau drawers while I'm tryin' to sleep. So I sneaks along the hedge for a ways, and then does the sleuthy approach across the lawn on the right flank. Another minute and I've made a quick spring and has my man pinned against the tree with both his wrists fast and my knee in his chest.

"Woof!" says he, deep and guttural.

"Excuse the warm welcome," says I, "but that's only a sample of what we pass out to stray visitors like you. Sizin' up the premises, were you, and gettin' ready to collect a few souvenirs?"

"A thousand pardons," says he, "if I have seem to intrude!"

"Eh?" says I. That wa'n't exactly the comeback you'd expect from a second-story worker, and he has a queer foreign twist to his words.

"It is possible," he goes on, "that I have achieved the grand mistake."

"Maybe," says I, loosenin' up on him a little. "What was it you thought you was after?"

"The house of one McCah-be," says he, "a professor of fists, I am told."

"That's a new description of me," says I, "but I'm the party. All of which don't prove, though, that you ain't a crook."

"Crook?" says he. "Ah, a felon! But no, Effendi. I come on an errand of peace, as Allah is good."

How was that now, havin' Allah sprung on me in my own front yard? Why travel?

"Say, come out here where I can get a better look," says I, draggin' him out of the shadow. "There! Well, of all the——"

No wonder I lost my breath; for what I've picked up off the front lawn looks like a stray villain from a comic opera. He's a short, barrel-podded gent, mostly costumed in a long black cape affair and one of these tasseled Turkish caps. About all the features I can make out are a pair of bushy eyebrows, a prominent hooked beak, and a set of crisp, curlin' black whiskers. Hardly the kind to go shinnin' up waterspouts or squeezin' through upper windows. Still, I'd almost caught him in the act.

"If that's a disguise you've got on," says I, "it's a bird. And if it ain't—say, let's hear the tale. Who do you claim to be, anyway?"

"Many pardons again, Effendi," says he, "but it is my wish to remain—what you call it?—incognito."

"Then you don't get your wish," says I. "No John Doe game goes with me. Out with it! Who and what?"

"But I make protest," says he. "Rather would I depart on my way."

"Ah, ditch that!" says I. "I caught you actin' like a suspicious character. Now, if you can account for yourself, I may turn you loose; but if you don't, it's a case for the police."

"Ah, no, no!" he objects. "Not the constables! Allah forbid! I—I will make explanation."

"Then let it come across quick," says I. "First off, what name are you flaggin' under?"

"At my home," says he, "I am known as Pasha Dar Bunda."

"Well, that's some name, all right," says I. "Now the next item, Pasha, is this, What set you to prowlin' around the home of one McCabe?"

"Ah, but you would not persist thus far!" says he, pleadin'. "That is a personal thing, something between myself and Allah alone."

"You don't say," says I. "Sorry to butt in, but I've got to have it all. Come, now!"

"But, Effendi——" he begins.

"No, not Fender," says I, "nor Footboard, or anything like that: just plain McCabe."

"It is a word of respect," says he, "such as Sir Lord; thus, Effendi McCabe."

"Well, cut out the frills and let's get down to brass tacks," says I. "You're here because you're here, I expect. But what else?"

He sighs, and then proceeds to let go of a little information. "You have under your roof," says he, "a Meesis Vogel, is it not?"

"Vogel?" says I, puzzled for a second. "You don't mean Lindy, do you?"

"She was called that, yes," says the Pasha, "Meelinda."

"But she's a Miss—old maid," says I.

"Ah?" says he, liftin' his bushy eyebrows. "A Mees, eh? It may be so. They tell me at her place of living that she is to be found here. Voila! That is all."

"But what about her?" says I. "Where do you come in?"

"Once when I am in England," says he, "many years gone past, I know her. I learn that she is in New York. Well, I find myself in America too. I thought to see her. Why not? A glimpse, no more."

"Is it the style where you come from," says I, "to gumshoe around and peek in the windows to see old friends?"

"In my country," says he, "men do not—but then we have our own customs. I have explain. Now I may depart."

"Not so fast, old scout!" says I. "If it's so you're a friend of Lindy, she'll be wantin' to see you, and all we got to do is to step inside and call her down."

"But thanks," says he. "It is very kind. I will not trouble, however. It need not be."

"Needn't, eh?" says I. "Look here, Pasha So and So, you can't put over anything so thin on me! You're up to something or other. You sure look it. Anyway, I'm goin' to march you in and find out from Lindy herself whether she knows you or not. Understand?"

He sighs resigned. "Since you are a professor of fists, it must be so," says he. "But remark this, I do not make the request to see her, and—and you may say to her that it is Don Carlos who is here."

"Ah-ha!" says I. "Another pen name, eh? Don Carlos! Low Dago, or Hidalgo?"

"My father," says he, "was a Spanish gentleman of Hebrew origin. My mother was French."

"Some combination!" says I. "And Lindy knows you best as Don Carlos, does she? We'll soon test that."

So I escorts him in by the side door, plants him in the livin' room where I can keep an eye on him, and hoohoos gentle up the stairs to Sadie.

"Yes?" says she.

"Shut the sewin' room door," says I.

"All right," says she. "Well?"

"There's a gent down here, Sadie," says I, "that looks like a cross between a stage pirate and an Armenian rug peddler."

"For goodness' sake!" says Sadie. "Not in the house! What on earth did you let him in for?"

"Because," says I, "he claims to be an old friend of Lindy's."

"Of Lindy's!" she gasps. "Why, what——"

"I don't know the rest," says I. "You spring it on her. Tell her it's Don Carlos, and then let me know what she says."

That seems like a simple proposition; but Sadie takes a long time over it. I could hear her give a squeal of surprise at something, and then she seems to be askin' a lot of fool questions. In the course of five or six minutes, though, she leans over the stair rail lookin' sort of excited.

"Well?" says I. "Does she know him?"

"Know him!" says Sadie. "Why, she says he's her husband!"

"Not Lindy's!" I gasps.

"That's what she says," insists Sadie.

"Great Scott!" says I. "Must be some mistake about this. Wait a minute. Here, you, Pasha! Come here! Lindy says you're her husband. Is that so?"

"Oh, yes," says he, as easy as you please. "Under your laws I suppose I am."

"Well, wouldn't that frost you!" says I.

"But, say, Sadie, why don't she come down and see him, then?"

"Just what I've been asking her," says Sadie. "She says she's too busy, and that if he wants to see her he must come up."

"Well, what do you know!" says I. "Pasha, do you want to see her?"

"As I have told," says he, "there is no need. I do not demand it."

"Well, of all the cold-blooded pairs!" says I. "How long since you've seen her?"

"Very long," says he; "perhaps twenty years."

"And now all you can work up is a mild curiosity for a glimpse through the window, eh?" says I.

He shrugs his shoulders careless.

"Then, by the great horned spoon," I goes on, "you're goin' to get what you came after! Trail along upstairs after me. This way. In through here. There you are, Pasha! Lindy, here's your Don Carlos!"

"Oh!" says she, lookin' up from the shirt-waist she was bastin' a sleeve on, and not even botherin' to take the pins out of her mouth.

And maybe they ain't some cross-mated couple too! This Pasha party shows up ponderous and imposin', in spite of the funny little fez arrangement on his head. He's thrown his cloak back, revealin' a regulation frock coat; but under that is some sort of a giddy-tinted silk blouse effect, and the fringed ends of a bright red sash hangs down below his knee on the left side. He's got a color on him like the inside of an old coffeepot, and the heavy, crinkly beard makes him look like some foreign Ambassador. While Lindy—well, in her black sewin' dress and white apron, she looks slimmer and more old maidish than ever.

He confines his greetin' to a nod of the head, and stands there gazin' at her as calm as if he was starin' at some stranger in the street.

"I suppose you've come to take me away with you, Carlos?" says she.

"No," says he.

"But I thought," says Lindy, "I—I thought some day you might. I didn't know, though. I haven't planned on it."

"Is it your wish to go with me?" says he.

"Why, I'm your wife, you know," says she.

"You had my letters, did you?" he goes on.

"Four," says she. "There was one from Spain, when you were a brigand, and another——"

"A brigand!" breaks in Sadie. "Do you mean that, Lindy?"

"Wasn't that it?" asks Lindy of him.

"For two years, Madam," says Don Carlos, bowin' polite. "A dull sort of business, mingling so much with stupid tourists. Bah! And such small gains! By the time you have divided with the soldiers little is left. So I gave it up."

"The next came from that queer place," says Lindy, "Port—Port——"

"Port Said," helps out Pasha, "where I had a gambling house. That was good for a time. Rather lively also. We had too much shooting and stabbing, though. It was an English officer, that last one. What a row! In the night I left for Tunisia."

"Oh, yes, Tunis," says Lindy. "Something about slaves there, wasn't it?"

"Camels also," says Pasha. "I traded in both stolen camels and smuggled slaves."

He throws this off as casual as if he was tellin' about sellin' sewin' machines. I glances over to see how Sadie's takin' it, and finds her drawin' in a long breath.

"Well, I never!" says she explosive. "What a shameless wretch! And you dared confess all this to Lindy?"

"Pardon, Madam," says he, smilin' until he shows most of his white teeth, "but I desired no misunderstanding. It is my way with women, to tell them only what is true. If they dislike that—well, there are many others."

"Humph!" says Sadie, tossin' her head. "Lindy, do you hear that?"

Lindy nods and keeps right on bastin' the sleeve.

"But how did you ever come to marry such a person, Lindy?" Sadie demands.

Carlos executes another smile at this and bows polite. "It was my fault," says he. "I was in England, waiting for a little affair that happened in Barcelona to blow over. By chance I saw her in her father's shop. Ah, you may find it difficult to believe now, Madam, but she was quite charming,—cheeks flushed like dawn on the desert, eyes like the sea, and limbs as lithe as an Arab maiden's! I talked. She listened. My English was poor; but it is not always words that win. These British girls, though! They cannot fully understand romance. It was she who insisted on marriage. I cared not a green fig. What to me was the mumbling of a churchman, I who cared not for the priests of my mother nor the rabbi of my father? Pah! Two weeks later I gave her some money and left her. Once more in the mountains of Spain I could breathe again—and I made the first English we caught settle the whole bill. That is how it came to be, Madam. Ask her."

Sadie looks at Lindy, who nods. "Father drove me out when I went back," says she; "so I came over here. Carlos had told me where to write. You got all my letters, did you, Carlos?"

"Oh, yes," says he. Then, turnin' to Sadie, "A wonderful writer of letters, Madam,—one every month!"

"Then you knew about little Carlos?" puts in Lindy. "It was a pity. Such lovely big black eyes. He was nearly two. I wish you could have seen him."