"I also had regret," says Carlos. "I read that letter many times. It was because of that, I think, that I continued to read the others, and was at pains to have them sent to me. They would fill a hamper, all of them."

"What!" says Sadie. "After you knew the kind of monster he was, Lindy, did you keep on writing to him?"

"But he was still my husband," protested Lindy.

"Bah!" says Sadie, throwin' a scornful glance at the Pasha.

Don Carlos he spreads out his hands, and shrugs his shoulders. "These English!" says he. "At first I laughed at the letters. They would come at such odd times; for you can imagine, Madam, that my life has been—well, not as the saints'. And to many different women have I read bits of these letters that came from so far,—to dancing girls, others. Some laughed with me, some wept. One tried to stab me with a dagger afterward. Women are like that. You never know when they will change into serpents. All but this one. Think! Month after month, year after year, letters, letters; about nothing much, it is true, but wishing me good health, happiness, asking me to have care for myself, and saying always that I was loved! Well? Can one go on laughing at things like that? Once I was dangerously hurt, a spearthrust that I got near Biskra, and the letter came to me where I lay in my tent. It was like a soothing voice, comforting one in the dark. Since then I have watched for those letters. When chance brought me to this side of the world, I found myself wishing for sight of the one who could remain ever the same, could hold the faith in the faithless for so long. So here I am."

"Yes, and you ought to be in jail," says Sadie emphatic. "But, since you're not, what do you propose doing next?"

"I return day after to-morrow," says Don Carlos, "and if the lady who is my wife so wills it she shall go with me."

"Oh, shall she!" says Sadie sarcastic. "Where to, pray?"

"To El Kurfah," says he.

"And just where," says Sadie, "is that?"

"Three days by camel south from Moorzook," says he. "It is an oasis in the Libyan Desert."

"Indeed!" says Sadie. "And what particular business are you engaged in there,—gambling, robbing, slave selling, or——"

"In El Kurfah," breaks in Don Carlos, bowin' dignified, "I am Pasha Dar Bunda, Minister of Foreign Affairs and chief business agent to Hamid-al-Illa; who, as you may know, is one of the half-dozen rulers claiming to be Emperor of the Desert. Frankly, I admit he has no right to such a title; but neither has any of the others. Hamid, however, is one of the most up-to-date and successful of all the desert chieftains. My presence here is proof of that. I came to arrange for large shipments of dates and ivory, and to take back to Hamid an automobile and the latest phonograph records."

"I don't like automobiles," says Lindy, finishin' up the sleeve.

"Neither does Hamid," says Pasha; "but he says we ought to have one standing in front of the royal palace to impress the hill tribesmen when they come in. Do you go back to El Kurfah with me, Mrs. Vogel?"

"Yes," says Lindy, rollin' up her apron.

"But, Lindy!" gasps Sadie. "To such a place, with such a man!"

"He is my husband, you know," says she.

And Lindy seems to think when she's put that over that she's said all there was to say on the subject. Sadie protests and threatens and begs. She reminds her what a deep-dyed villain this Carlos party is, and forecasts all sorts of dreadful things that will likely happen to her if she follows him off. But it's all wasted breath.

And all the while Pasha Dar Bunda, alias Don Carlos Vogel, stands there smilin' polite and waitin' patient. But in the end he walks out triumphant, with Lindy, holdin' her little black bag in one hand and her old umbrella in the other, followin' along in his wake.

Then last Friday we went down to one of them Mediterranean steamers to see 'em actually start. And, say, this slim, graceful party in the snappy gray travelin' dress, with the smart lid and all the gray veils on, looks about as much like the Lindy we'd known as a hard-boiled egg looks like a frosted cake. Lindy has bloomed out.

"And when we get to El Kurfah guess what Carlos is going to give me!" she confides to Sadie. "A riding camel and Batime. He's one of the best camel drivers in the place, Batime. And I have learned to salaam and say 'Allah il Allah.' Everyone must do that there. And in our garden are dates and oranges growing. Only fancy! There will be five slaves to wait on me, and when we go to the palace I shall wear gold bracelets on my ankles. Won't that seem odd? It's rather warm in El Kurfah, you know; but I sha'n't mind. Early in the morning, when it is cool, I shall ride out into the sandhills with Carlos. He is going to teach me how to shoot a lion."

She was chatterin' along like a schoolgirl, and when the boat pulls out of the slip she waves jaunty to us. Don Carlos, leanin' over the rail alongside of her, gazes at her sort of admirin'.

"El Kurfah, eh?" says I to Sadie. "That's missin' the Old Ladies' Home by some margin, ain't it?"



CHAPTER X

A CASE OF NOBODY HOME

"Yes," says J. Bayard Steele, adjustin' the chin part in his whiskers and tiltin' back comf'table in his chair, "I am beginning to think that the late Pyramid Gordon must have been a remarkably good judge of human nature."

"For instance?" says I.

"His selection of me as an executor of his whimsical will," says he.

"Huh!" says I. "How some people do dislike themselves! Now, if you want to know my views on that subject, J. B., I've always thought that was one of his battiest moves."

But he's got a hide like a sample trunk, Mr. Steele has. He only shrugs his shoulders. "Yes, you have given me similar subtle hints to that effect," says he. "And I will admit that at first I had doubts as to my fitness. The doing of kind and generous acts for utter strangers has not been a ruling passion with me. But so far I have handled several assignments—in which have I failed?"

"Look who's been coachin' you, though!" says I.

J. Bayard bows and waves a manicured hand graceful. "True," he goes on, "your advice has been invaluable on occasions, friend McCabe; especially in the early stages of my career as a commissioned agent of philanthropy. But I rather fancy that of late I have developed an altruistic instinct of my own; an instinct, if I may say so, in which kindly zeal is tempered by a certain amount of practical wisdom."

"Fine!" says I. "Bein' a little floral tribute, I take it, from Mr. Steele to himself."

"Unless it should occur to you, McCabe," says he, "to make the distinction between offensive egoism and pardonable pride."

"I don't get you," says I; "but I feel the jab. Anyhow, it's instructin' and elevatin' to hear you run on. Maybe you've got somethin' special on your mind?"

"I have," says he, producin' an envelope with some notes scribbled on the back.

"Is that No. 6 on the list?" says I. "Who's the party?"

"Here," says he, tappin' the envelope impressive, "are my findings and recommendations in the case of Hackett Wells."

"Shoot it," says I, settlin' back in the desk chair.

It's a pity too I can't give you all the high English J. Bayard uses up in statin' this simple proposition; for he's in one of them comf'table, expandin', after-luncheon moods, when his waist band fits tight and the elegant language just flows from him like he had hydrant connection with the dictionary.

It seems, though, that this Wells party had been sort of a partner of Pyramid's back in the early days. Some sort of a buyers' pool for Eastern coal deliveries, I believe it was, that Hackett had got into accidental and nursed along until he found himself dividin' the cream of the profits with only half a dozen others. Then along came Pyramid with his grand consolidation scheme, holdin' out the bait of makin' Mr. Wells head of the new concern and freezin' out all the rest.

Wells, he swallows it whole: only to wake up a few months later and discover that he's been double crossed. Havin' served his turn, Gordon has just casually spilled him overboard, thinkin' no more of doin' it than he would of chuckin' away a half-smoked cigar.

But to Hackett Wells this was a national calamity. Havin' got in with the easy-money bunch by a fluke in the first place, he wa'n't a man who could come back. Course he brought suit, and wasted a lot of breath callin' Pyramid hard names from a safe distance; but Pyramid's lawyers wore him out in the courts, and he was too busy to care who was cussin' him.

So Mr. Wells and his woe drops out of sight. He's managed to keep hold of a little property that brings him in just enough to scrub along on, and he joins that hungry-eyed, trembly-fingered fringe of margin pikers that hangs around every hotel broker's branch in town, takin' a timid flier now and then, but tappin' the free lunch hard and reg'lar. You know the kind,—seedy hasbeens, with their futures all behind 'em.

And in time, broodin' over things in gen'ral, it got to Hackett Wells in his weak spot,—heart, or liver, or something. Didn't quite finish him, you understand, but left him on the scrapheap, just totterin' around and stavin' off an obituary item by bein' mighty careful.

"I suppose Gordon must have heard something of the shape he was in," says J. Bayard, "when he included him in his list. Well, I hunted him up the other day, in a cheap, messy flat-house to the deuce and gone up Eighth avenue, got his story from him, and decided on a way of helping him out."

"Want to buy him a coal mine, or something like that?" says I.

J. Bayard refuses to notice my little sarcastic play. "I am sure Pyramid would have wanted this worn-out, cast-off tool of his to end his days decently," goes on Mr. Steele; "but to give him a lump sum would be worse than useless. Two or three plunges, and it would be all gone."

"Think of puttin' him in a home somewhere?" says I.

"That might be a good plan," says Steele, "if he was still a widower; but it appears that he has married again,—a young woman too, some waitress that he met in a quick-lunch place. I saw her. Bah! One of these plump, stupid young females, who appeared in a dingy dressing gown with her hair down. What an old fool! But I suppose she takes care of him, in a way. So I thought that an annuity, of say a thousand or two, paid in monthly installments, would be the wisest. That would enable them to move out into the country, get a nice little house, with a garden, and really live. It was pathetic to see how grateful he was when I told him of my scheme. Of course, McCabe, all this is subject to your indorsement. Thought you might like to have a talk with them first, and see for yourself; so I asked them to meet me here about——"

"Guess they're right on time," says I as the studio door opens, and in drifts a December-and-May pair that answers all the details of his description.

The old boy might have been still in the sixties; but with his remnant of white hair, watery eyes, and ashy cheeks he looks like a reg'lar antique. Must have been one of these heavy-set sports in his day, a good feeder, and a consistent drinker; but by the flabby dewlaps and the meal-bag way his clothes hang on him I judge he's slumped quite a lot. Still, he's kind of a dignified, impressive old ruin, which makes the contrast with the other half of the sketch all the more startlin'.

She's a bunchy blonde, she is, about four foot six in her French heels, with yellow hair, China-doll eyes, a snub nose, and a waxy pink and white complexion like these show-window models you see in department stores. She's costumed cheap but gaudy in a wrinkled, tango-colored dress that she must have picked off some Grand street bargain counter late last spring. The ninety-nine-cent soup-plate lid cocked over one ear adds a rakish touch that almost puts her in the comic valentine class.

But when I'm introduced to the old scout he glances fond at her and does the honors graceful. "Mrs. Wells, Professor," says he, and she executes an awkward duck response.

While the three of us are talkin' over J. Bayard's proposition she sits at one side, starin' blank and absentminded, as if this was somethin' that don't concern her at all.

It ain't a long debate, either. Hackett Wells seems satisfied with most any arrangement we want to make. He's a meek, broken old sport, grateful for anything that comes his way. That's what led me to insist on boostin' the ante up to twenty-five hundred, I guess; for it didn't look like he could go on pullin' that down for many years more. And of course J. Bayard is tickled to get my O.K. so easy.

"Then it's all settled," says Mr. Steele. "You will receive a check from the attorney of Mr. Gordon's estate on the first of every month. You and Mrs. Wells ought to start to-morrow to look for a place in some nice little country town and—why, what's the matter with your wife?"

She has her face in her hands, and her dumpy shoulders are heavin' up and down passionate. At first I couldn't make out whether it's woe, or if she's swallowed a safety pin. Anyway, it's deep emotion of some kind.

"Why, Deary!" says Mr. Wells, steppin' over and pattin' her on the back.

But that don't have any effect. The heavin' motion goes right on, and no answer comes from Deary.

"Mabel! Mabel, dear!" insists Hackett. "Tell me what is wrong. Come now!"

Mabel just shakes off his hand and continues her chest gymnastics. Also she begins kickin' her heels against the chair rungs. And as Hubby stands there lookin' helpless, with J. Bayard starin' disturbed, but makin' no move, it appears like it was up to me to take a hand.

"Don't mind the furniture, Ma'am," says I. "Take a whack at the desk too, if you like; but after you're through throwin' the fit maybe you'll let us know what it's all about."

At which she begins rockin' back and forth and moanin' doleful. A couple of hairpins works loose and drops to the floor.

"Excuse me, Ma'am," says I, "but you're goin' to lose the inside of that French roll if you keep on."

That fetched her out of it in a hurry. Grabbin' wild at her back hair, she sat up and faced us, with no signs at all of real weeps in her eyes.

"I won't live in the country, I won't!" she states explosive.

"Why, Mabel dear!" protests Mr. Wells.

"Ah, don't be an old bonehead!" comes back Mabel. "What's the idea, wishin' this Rube stuff on us? You can just count me out, Hacky, if that's the game. Do you get me?"

Hacky does. "I'm very sorry, Gentlemen," says he, "to ask you to modify your generous terms; but I feel that my wife's wishes in the matter ought to be taken into account."

"Why—er—to be sure," says J. Bayard. "I merely suggested your living in the country because it seemed to me the wisest plan; but after all——"

"Do we look like a pair of jays, I'd like to know?" demands Mrs. Wells indignant. "And another thing: I don't stand for this so much a month dope, either. What's the good of a little now and then? If we've got anything coming to us, why not hand it over annual? There'd be some sense to that. Stick out for once a year, Hacky."

Which he done. She had him well trained, Mabel did. He shrugs his shoulders, tries to smile feeble, and spreads out his hands. "You see, Gentlemen," says he.

I must say too that Mr. Steele puts up a mighty convincin' line of talk, tryin' to show 'em how much better it would be to have a couple of hundred or so comin' in fresh on the first of every month, than to be handed a lump sum and maybe lose some of it, or run shy before next payday. He explains how he was tryin' to plan so the money might do 'em the most good, and unless it did how he couldn't feel that he'd done his part right.

"All of which," he goes on, "I am quite sure, Mrs. Wells, you will appreciate."

"Go on, you whiskered old stuff!" comes back Mabel spiteful. "How do you know so much what's good for us? You and your nutty dreams about cows and flower gardens and hens! I'd rather go back to Second avenue and frisk another quick-lunch job. Hand us a wad: that's all we want."

Course it was a batty piece of work, tryin' to persuade people to let you push money on 'em; but that's just where we stood. And in the end J. Bayard wipes his brow weary and turns to me.

"Well, McCabe, what do you say?" he asks. "Shall we?"

"I leave it with you," says I. "You're the one that's developed this what-do-you-call-it instinct, temperin' kindly zeal with practical wisdom, ain't you? Then go to it!"

So five minutes later Hackett Wells shuffles out with an order good for the whole twenty-five hundred in his pocket, and Mabel clingin' tight to his arm.



"So long, Profess," says she over her shoulder, as I holds the door open for 'em. "We're headed for happy days."

And J. Bayard Steele, gazin' after her, remarks puzzled, "Now just precisely what can she mean by that?"

"Bein' only a crude and simple soul, J. B.," says I, "I got to give it up. Anyhow, Mabel's entirely too thick a girl for me to see through."

Besides, not knowin' her tastes or little fads, how was I to guess her notion of happy days? Then again, I didn't have to. All that's clear is that Pyramid had wanted us to do some good turn for this old goat, to sort of even up for that spill of years gone by, and we'd done our best. Whether the money was to be used wise or not accordin' to our view was a problem that don't worry me at all. Might have once, when I was dead sure my dope on things in gen'ral was the only true dope. But I'm getting over that, I hope, and allowin' other folks to have theirs now and then. In fact, I proceeded to forget this pair as quick as possible, like you try to shake a bad dream when you wake up in the night. And I warned J. Bayard that if he didn't quit luggin' his punk philanthropy specimens into my studio I'd bar him out entirely.

Let's see, that was early in the summer, and it must have been just before Labor Day that I broke away for a week or so to run up into the White Mountains and bring back Sadie and little Sully. First off Sadie was plannin' to come by train; but by the time I got there she'd changed her mind and wanted to tour back in the machine.

"It's such gorgeous weather," says she, "and the leaves are turning so nicely! We'll take three days for it, making short runs and stopping at night wherever we like."

"You mean," says I, "stoppin' wherever you can find an imitation Waldorf-Castoria."

"Not at all," says she. "And you know some of these little automobile inns are perfectly charming."

Well, that's what brought us to this Sunset Lake joint the first night out. Somewhere in New Hampshire it was, or maybe Vermont. Anyway, it was right in the heart of the summer boarder belt, and it had all the usual vacation apparatus cluttered around,—tennis courts, bowling alleys, bathing floats, dancing pavilion, and a five-piece Hungarian orchestra, four parts kosher, that helped the crockery jugglers put the din in dinner.

It was a clean, well-kept place, though, and by the quality of the tomato bisque and the steamed clams that we started with I judged we was actually goin' to be surprised with some real food. We'd watched the last of the sunset glow fade out from the little toy lake, and while we was waitin' to see what the roast and vegetables might be like we gazed around at the dinner push that was filterin' in.

And what a job lot of humanity does have the coin to spend the summer, or part of it, at these four-a-day resorts! There's middle-aged sports, in the fifties or over, some of 'em with their fat, fussed-up wives, others with giddy young Number Twos; then there's jolly, sunburned, comf'table lookin' fam'ly parties, includin' little Brother with the peeled nose, and Grandmother with her white lace cap. Also there's quite a sprinklin' of widows, gay and otherwise, and the usual bunch of young folks, addin' lively touches here and there. All city people, you know, playin' at bein' in the country, but insistin' on Broadway food at Broadway prices.

Our waitress was just staggerin' in with a loaded tray, and Sadie was tryin' to induce little Sully not to give the college yell when he asked personal questions about folks at the next table, when I notices her glance curious at something over my head, then lower her eyes and sort of smile. Course I suspects something worth lookin' at might be floatin' down the aisle; so I half swings around to get a view. And I'd no sooner got it than I wished I hadn't been so curious; for the next second there comes, shrillin' sharp and raspy above the dinin' room clatter, a free and happy hail.

"Well, what do you know! Professor McCabe, ain't it!"

Me—I just sat there and gawped. I don't know as I could be blamed. Course, I'd seen bunchy little blondes before; but this was the first time I'd ever seen one that had draped herself in a rainbow. That's the only word for it. The thin, fluttery silk thing with the butterfly sleeves is shaded from cream white to royal purple, and underneath is one of these Dolly Varden gowns of flowered pink, set off by a Roman striped sash two feet wide. And when you add to that such details as gold shoes, pink silk stockin's, long pearl ear danglers, and a weird lid perched on a mountain of yellow hair—well, it's no wonder I was sometime rememberin' where I'd seen them China-doll eyes before.

"Deary," she goes on, turnin' to what's followin' her, "look who's here! Our old friend, the Profess!"

And with that she motions up a dignified old wreck dolled out in a white flannel suit and a red tie. If it hadn't been for that touch of red too, he sure would have looked ghastly; for there was about as much color in his face as there was in his white buckskin shoes. But he steps up spry and active and shoves out a greetin' hand.

I ain't got the nerve, either, to look at Sadie while I'm doin' the introducin'. I was watchin' Mrs. Hackett Wells sort of fascinated and listenin' to her chatter on.

"Well, if this don't froth the eggs!" says she, pattin' me chummy on the shoulder. "Havin' you show up like this! And, say, lemme put you wise,—here's where you want to stick around for a week or so. Yea, Bo! Perfectly swell bunch here, and something doin' every minute. Why, say, me and Deary has been here six weeks, and we've been havin' the time of our lives. Know what they call me here? Well, I'm the Hot Baby of Sunset Lake; and that ain't any bellboy's dream, either! I'm the one that starts things. Yes, and I keep 'em goin' too. Just picked this place out from the resort ads in the Sunday edition; and it was some prize pick, believe me! 'A quiet, refined patronage of exclusive people,' the picture pamphlet puts it, and I says to Deary, 'Me for that, with three wardrobe trunks full of glad rags.' So you can tell your friend with the face privet that we got to the country after all. Did I miss my guess? Never a miss! Why, say, some of these swell parties lives on West End avenue and the Drive, and I can call half of 'em by their first names. Can't I, Deary?"

And Hackett Wells nods, smilin' at her fond and sappy.

"Drop round to the dancin' pavilion later," says she, "and watch me push him through the onestep. After that me and one of the boys is goin' to tear off a little Maxixe stuff that'll be as good as a cabaret act, and about ten-thirt we'll tease Deary into openin' a couple of quarts in the cafe. So long! Don't forget, now!" And off she floats, noddin' cheerful right and left, and bein' escorted to her table by both head waiters.

I couldn't stave off meetin' Sadie's glance any longer. "Eh?" says I. "Why, that's only Mabel. Cunnin' little thing, ain't she?"

"Shorty," demands Sadie, "where on earth did you ever meet such a person?"

Then, of course, I had to sketch out the whole story. It was high time; for Sadie's lips was set more or less firm. But when she hears about J. Bayard's wise-boy plans for settlin' the Hackett Wells in some pastoral paradise, and how they got ditched by militant Mabel, she indulges in a grim smile.

"A brilliant pair of executors you and Mr. Steele are," says she, "if this is a sample of your work!"

"Ah, come, don't be rough, Sadie!" says I. "It's hard to tell, you know. What's the odds if they do have to go back to their little Eighth avenue flat next week? They're satisfied. Anyway, Mabel is. She's New York born and bred, she is, and now that she's had her annual blow she don't care what happens. Next year, if Deary hangs on, they'll have another."

"But it's so foolish of them!" insists Sadie.

"What else do you expect from a pair like that?" says I. "It's what they want most, ain't it? And there's plenty like 'em. No, they ain't such bad folks, either. Their hearts are all there. Just a case of vacancy in the upper stories: nobody home, you know."



CHAPTER XI

UNDER THE WIRE WITH EDWIN

If you must know, I was doin' a social duck. Not that I ain't more or less parlor broke by this time, or am apt to shy at a dinner coat, like a selfmade Tammany statesman when addressin' his fellow Peruvians. Nothing like that! Pick out the right comp'ny, and I can get through quite some swell feed without usin' the wrong fork more'n once or twice. I don't mind little fam'ly gatherin's at Pinckney's or the Purdy-Pells' now. I can even look a butler in the eye without feelin' shivery along the spine. But these forty-cover affairs at the Twombley-Cranes', with a dinner dance crush afterwards and a buffet supper at one-thirty A.M.—that's where I get off.

Sadie likes to take 'em in once in awhile, though, and as long as she'll spend what there's left of the night with friends in town, and don't keep me hangin' round until the brewery trucks and milk wagons begin to get busy, I ain't got any kick comin'.

It was one of these fussy functions I was dodgin'. I'd had my dinner at home, peaceable and quiet, while Sadie was dressin', and at that there was plenty of time left for me to tow her into town and land her at the Twombley-Cranes', where they had the sidewalk canopy out and an extra carriage caller on duty. I'd quit at the mat, though, and was slopin' down the front steps, when I'm held up by this sharp-spoken old girl with the fam'ly umbrella and the string bonnet.

"Young man," says she, plantin' herself square in front of me, "is this Mr. Twombley-Crane's house?"

"This is where it begins," says I, lookin' her over some amused; for that lid of hers sure was the quaintest thing on Fifth-ave.

"Humph!" says she. "Looks more like the way into a circus! What's this thing for?" and she waves the umbrella scornful at the canopy.

"Why," says I, "this is to protect the guests from the rude stares of the common herd; also it's useful in case of a shower."

"Of all things!" says she, sniffin' contemptuous.

"If you don't like the idea," says I, "suppose I mention it to Mr. Twombley-Crane? Maybe he'll take it down."

"That'll do, young man!" says she. "Don't try to be smart with me! And don't think I'm asking fool questions just out of curiosity! I'm related to Twombley-Crane."

"Eh?" says I, gawpin' at her.

"Cousin by marriage," says she.

"I—I take it all back then," says I. "Excuse my gettin' so gay. Come on a visit, have you?"

"Ye-e-es," says she hesitatin'; "that is, I s'pose we have. We ain't made up our minds exactly."

"We?" says I, gazin' around.

"Mr. Leavitt is behind the tent there, as usual," says she, "and he—— My land! I guess it's jest as well he is," she gasps, as a limousine rolls up to the front of the canopy, a liveried footman hops off the driver's seat, whisks open the door, and helps unload Mrs. K. Taylor French.

Quite some wishbone in front and more or less spinal column aft Mrs. K. Taylor is exposin' as she brushes past us up the strip of red carpet. So you could hardly blame the old girl for bein' jarred.

"Young man," says she, turnin' on me severe, "what's going on here to-night?"

"Dinner dance, that's all," says I.

"You mean they're having a lot of company in?" says she.

I nods.

"Then that settles it!" says she. "We don't go a step nearer to-night. But where we will stay, goodness only knows!"

She was pikin' off, her chin in the air, when it struck me that if these really was jay relations of the Twombley-Cranes, maybe I ought to lend 'em a helpin' hand. So I trails along until she brings up beside another party who seems to be waitin' patient just under the front windows.

He's a tall, stoop-shouldered gent, with a grayish mustache and a good deal of gold watch chain looped across his vest. In each hand he's holdin' a package careful by the strings, and between his feet is one of these extension canvas grips that you still see in use out in the kerosene circuit.

"Excuse me, Ma'am," says I, "but I'm more or less a friend of the fam'ly, and if you've come on special to visit 'em, maybe you'd better wait while I let 'em know you're here. My name's McCabe, and if you'll give me yours, why——"

"I'm Mrs. Sallie Leavitt, of Clarks Mills," says the old girl.

"Oh, yes," says I, "Clarks Mills. Up Skowhegan way, ain't it?"

"Vermont," says she. "This is Mr. Leavitt. I'm much obliged to you, Mr. McCabe, but you needn't bother about tellin' anyone anything. If they've got company, that's enough. I wish I'd never left Clarks Mills, that's what I wish!"

"Now, Sallie!" protests the other half of the sketch, speakin' mild and gentle.

"That'll do, Mr. Leavitt!" says she decided. "You know very well it was all along of your fussing and fretting about never having seen your cousin that we come to make this fool trip, anyway."

"I realize that, Sallie," says he; "but——"

"Mr. Leavitt," she breaks in, "will you be careful of them pies?" Then she turns to me apologizin'. "Course, it does seem sort of silly, travelin' around New York with two pumpkin pies; but I didn't know how good a cook the folks had here; and besides I don't take a back seat for anybody when it comes to mince or pumpkin. You see, I was planning to surprise Cousin Twombley by slipping 'em onto the table to-morrow for breakfast."

Say, the thought of what the Twombley-Cranes' English flunkies would do at the sight of pumpkin pie on the breakfast table was most too much for me. As it was, I had a bad coughin' fit, and when I recovered I suggests eager, "Well, why not? They'll keep a day or so, won't they?"

"Not while I'm as hungry as I am now," says she. "And I'm dog tired too. Young man, where'll we find a good, respectable tavern around here?"

"A which?" says I. "Oh! I get you—hotel. Now let's see. Why, I expect the best thing you can do is to jump in one of these motor buses and ride down to—no, I might's well go along, as it's right on my way home. Here's one coming now."

So we piles in, umbrella, pies, and all, and inside of half an hour I've landed the whole shootin' match safe in a two-fifty air-shaft room in one of those punk little ten-story hotels down in the 40's. I showed 'em how to work the electric light switch, got 'em some ice water, and pointed out the fire escape. In fact, I done everything but tuck 'em in bed, and I had said good-night twice and was makin' my getaway, when Mrs. Leavitt follows me out into the hall, shuttin' Hubby in by himself.

"Just one thing more, Mr. McCabe," says she. "I guess you needn't say anything to Twombley-Crane about our bein' here."

"Oh!" says I. "Goin' to spring it on him to-morrow yourself?"

"Maybe," says she, "and then again maybe I won't go near 'em at all. I'm going to think it over."

"I see," says I. "But I expect Mr. Leavitt will be up."

"What, alone?" says she. "Him? Not much!"

"Oh!" says I, and while I didn't mean it to show, I expect I must have humped my eyebrows a little. Anyway, she comes right back at me.

"Well, why should he?" she demands.

"Why, I don't know," says I; "only he—he's the head of the house, ain't he?"

"No, he ain't," says she. "I don't say it in a boasting spirit, for it's always been one of the trials of my life; but Mr. Leavitt ain't at the head of anything—never was, and never will be."

"Had plenty of chance, I expect?" says I sarcastic.

"Just the same chances other men have had, and better," says she. "Why, when we was first married I thought he was going to be one of the biggest men in this country. Everyone did. He looked it and talked it. Talk? He was the best talker in the county! Is yet, for that matter. Course, he'd been around a lot as a young man—taught school in Rutland for two terms, and visited a whole summer in Bellows Falls. Besides there was the blood, him being an own cousin to Twombley-Crane. Just that was most enough to turn my head, even if that branch of the family never did have much to do with the Leavitt side. But it's a fact that Mr. Leavitt's mother and Twombley-Crane's father were brother and sister."

"You don't mean it!" says I.

"Of course," she goes on, "the Leavitts always stayed poor country folks, and the Cranes went to the city and got rich. When the old homestead was left to Mr. Leavitt, though, he said he wasn't going to spend the rest of his life on an old, worn-out farm. No, Sir! He was going to do something better than that, something big! We all believed it too. For the first six months of our married life I kept my trunk packed, ready to start any minute for anywhere, expecting him to find that grand career he'd talked so much about. But somehow we never started. That wa'n't the worst of it, either. A year slipped by, and we hadn't done a thing,—didn't even raise enough potatoes to last us through Thanksgivin', and if we hadn't sold the hay standing and the apple crop on the trees I don't know how we'd got through the winter.

"Along about the middle of March I got my eyes wide open. I saw that if anything was done to keep us out of the poorhouse I'd got to do it. Old Mr. Clark wanted someone to help in the general store about then, and I took the job at six dollars a week. Inside of a year I was actin' postmistress, had full charge of the drygoods side, did all the grocery buyin', and was agent for a horse rake and mower concern. Six months later, when Mr. Clark gave up altogether and the store was for sale, I jumped in, mortgaged the Leavitt place all it would stand, borrowed fifteen hundred dollars from a brother-in-law back in Nova Scotia, and put a new sign over the door. That was over thirty years ago; but it's there yet. It reads, 'Mrs. Sallie Leavitt, General Merchandise.'"

"But where did Mr. Leavitt fit in?" says I.

"Humph!" says she. "Mostly he's set around the store and talked. Oh, he helps with the mail, cooks a little when I'm too rushed and ain't got any hired girl, and washes dishes. That's always been the one useful thing he could do,—wash dishes. I expect that's why everybody at the Mills calls him Mr. Sallie Leavitt. There! It's out. I don't know as I ever said that aloud before in my life. I've been too much ashamed. But I might's well face the truth now. He's just Mr. Sallie Leavitt. And if you don't think that hurts for me to have to own up to it, then you're mighty mistaken. Maybe you can guess too why I ain't so anxious to parade a husband like that before folks."

"Oh, well," says I, "sometimes a man gets tagged with a nickname like that and don't half deserve it."

"Huh!" says she. "You don't know Mr. Leavitt as I do. I wa'n't goin' to mention it; but—but—well, he's a book reader."

"A what?" says I.

"Reads books," says she. "Just reads and reads and reads. He's got what he calls our circulatin' lib'ry in a room he's fixed up over the store. Lends out books at five cents a week, you know. But, land! he reads more of 'em himself than any ten customers. History, explorin' books, and novels—specially novels about English society folks, like 'Lady Thingumbob's Daughter,' and so on. And the fool ideas he gets from 'em! I expect you'll laugh, but he actually tries to talk and act like them people he reads about. Learned to drink tea out of books, Mr. Leavitt has, and wants me to quit the store every afternoon about half past four and drink it with him. Think of that! And instead of havin' his supper at night he wants to call it dinner. Did you ever? Yes, Sir, that's the kind of tomfoolery I've been puttin' up with all these years, and tryin' to hide from the neighbors! Maybe you'll notice I always call him Mr. Leavitt? That's why; to cover up the fact that he's only—well, what they call him. And so, cousin or no cousin, I don't see how I'm goin' to bring myself to let the Twombley-Cranes know. Anyway, I want to sleep on it first. That's why I'd just as soon you wouldn't tell 'em we're here."

"I see," says I. "And you can bank on me."

I didn't peep a word, either. It's only the followin' evenin', though, that Sadie announces:

"What do you think, Shorty? A Vermont cousin of Mr. Twombley-Crane is in town, with his wife, and they're going to give them a dinner party Friday night."

"Gee!" says I. "I'd like to be there."

"You will be," says she; "for you are specially invited."

"Eh?" says I. "To meet the poor relations? How's that?"

"Who said they were poor?" says Sadie. "Why, Twombley-Crane says that his cousin's wife is one of the shrewdest business women he's ever heard of. He has been handling her investments, and says she must be worth half a million, at least; all made out of a country store, maple sugar bushes, and farm mortgages. I'm crazy to see her, aren't you?"

"What—Sallie?" says I. "Half a million! Must be some mistake."

Course I had to tell her then about the couple I'd run across, and about Mr. Sallie, and the pies, and the string bonnet. We had such a warm debate too, as to whether she was really well off or not, that next day my curiosity got the best of me, and I calls up the hotel to see if the Leavitts are in. Well, they was, and Mrs. Leavitt, when she finds who it is, asks pleadin' if I won't run up and see 'em a little while.

"Please come," says she; "for I'm completely flabbergasted. It's—it's about Mr. Leavitt."

"Why, sure," says I. "I'll come right up."

I finds 'em sittin' in their dull, bare little hotel room, one on each side of the bed, with the extension grip half packed on the floor. "Well," says I, "what's up?"

"Ask him," says she, noddin' at Mr. Sallie.

But Leavitt only hangs his head guilty and shuffles his feet. "Then I'll tell you," says she. "Yesterday he slipped out, hunted up his cousin, and got us invited to dinner. More'n that, he said we'd come."

"Well, why not go?" says I.

"Because," says she, "I—I just can't do it. I—I'm—well, we've been around some since we got here, lookin' into the big stores and so on, and I've been noticin' the women, how they talk and act and dress and—and—oh, I'm afraid, that's all!"

"Why, Sallie!" says Mr. Leavitt.

"Yes, I am," she insists. "I'm plumb scared at the thought of mixin' with folks like that—just plumb scared. And, as you know, Mr. Leavitt, it's the first time in my life I've ever been afraid of anything."

"Yes, that's so," says he, "that's so, Sallie. But you're not going to be afraid now. Why should you?"

"Listen to him, Mr. McCabe!" says she. "Do you know what he wants me to do? Spend a lot of money on clothes and rig myself up like—like that woman we saw the other night!"

"And you're going to do it too," says Mr. Leavitt. "You can afford to have the best there is,—a Paris frock, and the things that go with it. I mean you shall, not for my sake, but for your own. You're a wonderful woman, Sallie, and you ought to know it for once in your life. I want my cousin to know it too. You've not only got more brains than most women, but you're mighty good looking, and in the proper clothes you could hold up your head in any company."

"Pshaw!" says Mrs. Leavitt, almost blushin'. "Right before Mr. McCabe too!"

"Well, isn't it so?" demands Mr. Leavitt, turnin' to me.

"Why—er—of course it is," says I.

I tried to make it enthusiastic, and if it come out a little draggy it must have been on account of that ancient lid of hers that's hangin' in full view on one of the bedposts. As a matter of fact, she's one of these straight-built, husky, well-colored dames, with fairly good lines in spite of what the village dressmaker had done to her.

"There!" says Mr. Leavitt. "Now let's have no more talk of going home. Let's go out and get the clothes right now. Perhaps Mr. McCabe can show us where we can buy the right things."

"Land sakes! What a man you are, Mr. Leavitt!" says Sallie, weakenin' a little.

Five minutes more of that kind of talk, and he'd got her to tie on her bonnet. Then, with me leadin' the way and him urgin' her on from behind, we starts on our shoppin' expedition.

"It's to be a complete outfit, from the ground up, ain't it?" says I.

"That's it," says Mr. Leavitt.

So, instead of botherin' with any department stores, I steers 'em straight for Madame Laplante's, where they set you back hard, but can furnish a whole trousseau, I'm told, at an hour's notice.

Mrs. Leavitt was still protestin' that maybe she wouldn't do any more than look at the things, and how she wouldn't promise to wear 'em even if she did buy a few; but you know what smooth salesladies they have in such places. When I left two of 'em was gushin' over Mrs. Leavitt's chestnut-tinted hair that she had piled up in slick coils under the bonnet, and a third was runnin' a tape over her skillful. If it had been anybody but Mrs. Sallie Leavitt, I'd have hated to take chances on havin' to write the check when it was all over.

"Well, is she coming?" asks Sadie that night.

"Search me," says I. "I wouldn't bet a nickel either way."

That was Wednesday. All day Thursday I was expectin' to be called in again, or hear that Sallie had made a break back for Vermont. But not a word. Nor on Friday, either. So at seven o'clock that night, as we collected in the Twombley-Cranes' drawin' room, there was some suspense; for at least half of us were wise to the situation. At seven-fifteen, though, they arrives.

And, say, I wish you could have seen Mrs. Sallie Leavitt of Clarks Mills! I don't know what it cost to work the miracle, but, believe me, it was worth twice the money! Leavitt was dead right. All she needed was the regalia. And she'd got it too,—sort of a black lacy creation, with jet spangles all over it, and long, sweepin' folds from the waist down, and with all that hair of hers done up flossy and topped with a fancy rhinestone headdress, she looked tall and classy. And stunnin'? Say, she had a neck and shoulders that made that Mrs. K. Taylor French party look like a museum exhibit!

Then there was Mr. Leavitt, all dolled up as correct as any cotillion leader, balancin' his silk tile graceful on one wrist, and strokin' his close-cropped mustache with his white glove, just as Mrs. Humphry Ward describes on page 147.

"Well!" gasps Sadie. "I thought you said they were a pair of countrified freaks!"

"You should have seen 'em when they landed with the pies," says I.

And, if you'll believe me, Mr. Leavitt not only had on the costume, but he had the lines too. Sounded a little booky in spots maybe; but he was right there with the whole bag of chatty tricks,—the polite salute for the hostess, a neat little epigram when it come his turn to fill in the talk, a flash or so of repartee, and an anecdote that got a good hand all round the table. You see, he was sort of doublin' in brass, as it were; conversin' for two, you know. For Sallie was playin' it safe, watchin' how the others negotiated the asparagus, passin' up all the dishes she couldn't dope out, and sayin' mighty little. Mostly she's watchin' Mr. Leavitt, her eyes growin' brighter and rounder as the meal progresses, and at last fairly beamin' across the table at him.

I didn't quite get the slant of all this until later, when we'd finished and was trailin' into the lib'ry. Mrs. Leavitt breaks loose from Twombley-Crane and falls back alongside of me.

"Well, how goes it?" says I. "Wasn't so bad, after all, was it?"

"Don't tell anyone," she whispers, "but I'm so scared I'd like to yell and run away. I would too, if it wasn't for Edwin."

"Who?" says I.

"Mr. Leavitt," says she. "He's going to be Edwin to me after this, though—my Edwin. Isn't he great, though? Course, I always knew he was a good talker, and all that; but to do it in comp'ny, before a lot of city folks—well, I must say I'm mighty proud of such a husband, mighty proud! And anybody who ever calls him Mr. Sallie Leavitt again has got to reckon with me! They'll never have a chance to do it in Clarks Mills. The Mills ain't good enough for Edwin. I've just found that out. And to think that all these years I've believed it was the other way round! But I'm going to make up for all that. You'll see!"

Uh-huh! Mrs. Leavitt's a woman of her word. Soon as she can settle up things at the store, foreclose a few mortgages, and unload a few blocks of stock that can't be carried safe without watchin', it's goin' to be the grand European tour for her and Edwin, and maybe a house in town when they come back.

"Which only goes to show, Mrs. McCabe," says I, "how it's never too late to discover that, after all, old Hubby's the one best bet on the card."

"Pooh!" says Sadie. "It isn't always safe to let him know it, even if you have."



CHAPTER XII

A FIFTY-FIFTY SPLIT WITH HUNK

"And believe me, Shorty," goes on Mr. Hunk Burley, tappin' a stubby forefinger on my knee, and waggin' his choppin'-block head energetic, "when I get behind a proposition yuh goin' to get some action."

"Sure, I know, Hunk," says I, glancin' up at the clock uneasy and squirmin' a bit in the swing chair.

You see, this had been goin' on now for near an hour, and while it might be more or less entertainin' as well as true, I wa'n't crazy about listenin' to it all the afternoon. For one thing, I wa'n't comin' in on his scheme. Not a chance. I can be bilked into buyin' tickets for a raffle, even when I wouldn't take the junk that's put up as a gift, and I'm easy in other ways; but when it comes to any gate-money game, from launchin' a musical comedy to openin' a new boxin' club, I'm Tight Tommy with the time lock set. None in mine! I've had my guesses as to what the public wants, and I know I'm a perfectly punk prophet.

Besides, it was about time for J. Bayard Steele to show up with this gent from Washington, Cuyler Morrison De Kay, and—well, I'd just as soon not be bothered to explain Hunk Burley to a pair like that. You know the kind of bygone friends that do need explainin'—well, Hunk needed it bad; for as far as looks went he was about the crudest party that ever sported a diamond elephant stickpin or chewed twenty-five-cent cigars for a steady diet.

Built wide and substantial, Hunk was, with the longest arms you ever saw outside an iron cage, and a set of rugged features that had the Old Man of the Mountain lookin' like a ribbon clerk. Reg'lar cave dweller's face, it was; and with his bristly hair growin' down to a point just above his eyes, and the ear tufts, and the mossy-backed paws—well, if there ever was a throw-back to the Stone Age he was it.

As a rubber in my old trainin' camp outfit, though, Hunk had his good points. I've gone on the table to him with a set of shoulder muscles as stiff as a truck trace and inside of half an hour jumped up as limber as a whale-bone whip. And I'd never sign up for more'n a ten-round go without sendin' for Hunk first thing after the forfeits was up. Course, when it come to society, there was others I liked better, and I expect after I quit the ring I didn't take any particular pains to keep his name in my address book.

But Hunk was one of the old crowd that didn't need much dodgin'. He went his way like I went mine, and I hadn't seen him for years when he tramps into the studio here the other noon, treadin' heavy on his heels and wearin' this suit of peace-disturbin' plaids. He hadn't climbed the stairs just for any Auld Lang Syne nonsense, either. He was there on business.

That is, it seemed like business to him; for, in his special way, Hunk had been comin' along. He hadn't stuck to bein' a rubber. He'd done a strong-man turn with a medicine top for awhile, then he'd worked into the concession game on the county fair circuit, managed a Ferris wheel and carrousel outfit, and even swung an Uncle Tom troupe, with six real bloodhounds, through the town halls of fourteen States.

"Pullin' down the kale by the double handsful, mind you," says Hunk. "But no more! The movies has queered the Topsy business. Absolutely! I seen it comin' just in time, and I've been layin' low until I could find something to beat it. Say, I've got it too. Not for this territory. I'll give the film people two years more to kill themselves in the North, with the rot they're puttin' out. But in the South they ain't got such a hold, and the folks are different. They're just old style enough down there to fall for a street parade and fifty-cent seats on the blue benches. They got the coin too—don't make no mistake about that. And this Great Australian Hippodrome will make 'em loosen up like a Rube showin' his best girl what he can do throwin' baseballs at the dummies. Yea, Bo! It's the biggest bargain on the market too. Come in with me, Shorty, on a half int'rest, splittin' fifty-fifty."

"Too big a gamble, Hunk," says I. "I've seen more money dropped on ring shows than——"

"But we carry a pair of boxin' kangaroos," he breaks in eager, "that pulls an act they go nutty over. And our tribe of original wild Bush people has never been shown this side of Melbourne."

"Sorry, Hunk," says I, "but if I had all that money tied up in billboard sheets and smoky canvas, I couldn't sleep well on windy nights. None of your flat-car hippodromes for me. That's final! Besides, I got a date with a couple of swells that's liable to show up here any minute, and I ought to——"

What I really ought to have done was to have chucked a table cover over Hunk and played him for a piece of statuary; but before I can make a move in walks J. Bayard and this Washington gent. Next minute we was bein' introduced, and all I can do is stand in front of Hunk with one hand behind me, givin' him the fade-away signal energetic.

Does he get it? Not Hunk! The one real sensitive spot in his system can be reached only by sluggin' him behind the ear with a bung starter, and I didn't have one handy. He shoves his chair back into the corner and continues to gawp; so I just has to let on that he ain't there at all.

Course I'd been put wise to who this Cuyler Morrison De Kay was. He's what Mr. Steele calls an object of altruism. In other words, he's No. 7 on Pyramid Gordon's list, and our job is to frame up for him some kind and generous deed, accordin' to the specifications of the will. As usual too, J. Bayard had got all balled up over doin' it; for while Mr. De Kay ain't quite the plute he looks, it turns out he's holdin' down one of them government cinches, with a fat salary, mighty little real work, and no worry. He's a widower, and a real elegant gent too. You could tell that by the wide ribbon on his shell eyeglasses and the gray suede gloves.

I could see in a minute that he'd sort of put the spell on Steele, most likely because he was a genuine sample of what J. Bayard was givin' only a fair imitation of. You know, one of these straight-backed, aristocratic old boys that somehow has the marks of havin' been everywhere, seen everything, and done everything. You'd expect him to be able to mix a salad dressin' a la Montmartre, and reel off anecdotes about the time when he was a guest of the Grand Duke So and So at his huntin' lodge. Kind of a faded, thin-blooded, listless party, somewhere in the late fifties, with droopy eye corners and a sarcastic bite to his offhand remarks.

I may as well admit that I didn't take so kindly to Cuyler from the first. Also I was a little peeved at J. Bayard when I discovers he's lugged him up here without findin' out much about him. Hadn't even asked De Kay how it was him and Pyramid Gordon had bumped up against one another. So I fires that at him straight.

"Let's see," says I, "where was it you and Mr. Gordon got mixed up?"

"Gordon?" says he, shruggin' his shoulders and smilin' cynical. "Really, I can't conceive just why he should remember me. True, during our brief acquaintance, he showed a most active dislike for me; but I assure you it was not mutual. A man of Gordon's type—— Bah! One simply ignores them, you know."

"You don't say!" says I. "Now I had an idea that wa'n't so dead easy—ignorin' Pyramid."

Cuyler humps his gray eyebrows as if he was slightly annoyed. "I was referring merely to his offensive personality," he goes on. "One does not quarrel with a bulldog for its lack of manners."

"Ah, come!" says I. "Maybe he took you for one of these parlor spaniels and was tryin' to throw a scare into you with a few growls."

I could hear J. Bayard gasp protestin'; but Cuyler shrugs it off without wincin'. "Just how he regarded me was a subject to which I gave not the slightest thought," says he. "I was concerned only with his enterprise of crossing the Peoria & Dayton at grade in the face of an injunction issued by the State supreme court. You see, I happened to be president of the road at the time."

"Now we're gettin' to the plot of the piece," says I. "You blocked him off, eh?"

"I did my best," says Mr. De Kay. "Of course I was not a practical railroad man. I'd been somewhat of a figurehead, you understand. But in this emergency I was called back from Europe and at the urgent request of the directors I assumed active charge. My first step was to secure the injunction."

"Which worried him, I expect?" says I, winkin' at J. Bayard.

"Quite as much as if I had sent a note by my office boy," says Cuyler. "He rushed a construction train with two hundred men to the spot and gave the order himself to tear up our tracks. Well, it was rather a spirited contest. I mobilized our entire working force, had them sworn in as deputy sheriffs, and kept three switch engines moving up and down the line. For forty-eight hours we held them back."

"And then?" says I.

Cuyler executes that careless shoulder shrug once more. "Rifles," says he. "I suppose I should have retaliated with machine guns; but I preferred to put my trust in the law of the land. Of course I found out how absurd that was later on. Gordon crossed our grade. After four or five years of expensive litigation we gave up. By that time our road had become part of the Gordon system. I was glad to get 48 for my holdings; so you see his victory was quite complete. But the only real personal contact I had with him was during those two days of the crossing war when we took our meals at the wretched little hotel, facing each other across the table. Fancy! His coarse attempts to treat the situation humorously were more offensive, if anything, than his guerrilla business tactics. An ill-bred, barbarous fellow, this Gordon of yours."

"Huh!" says I. "He wa'n't any parlor entertainer, that's a fact; but take it from me, Mr. De Kay, he was a good deal of a man, for all that."

"So, I presume, was Captain Kidd," sneers Cuyler, "and Jesse James."

"Maybe," I comes back kind of hot. "But Pyramid Gordon was white enough to want to divide his pile among the poor prunes he'd put out here and there along the way. You're on the list too, and the chief object of this little tete-a-tete is to frame up some plan of givin' you a boost."

"So Mr. Steele gave me to understand," says Cuyler. "In my case, however, the reparation comes a little late. The fact is, Gentlemen, that I—well, why quibble? I may be good for another ten or a dozen years. But I shall go on just as I've been going on, following my daily routine in the department, at my club, at my bachelor quarters. You get into it, you know,—bath, breakfast, desk, dinner, a rubber or two of bridge, and bed. A trifle monotonous, but a comfortable, undisturbed, assured existence. I may have had ambitions once,—yes, I'm quite sure,—but no longer. After my—er—my elimination, I got this place in the department. There I've stuck for fifteen years. I've settled into official routine; I'm fixed there hard and fast. It's so with many of us. Most of us recognize the hopelessness of ever pulling out. At least I do, fully. As I sometimes confess, I am merely one of the unburied dead. And there you are!"

Kind of took me off my guard, that did. And me about to knock him so hard! I glances over at J. Bayard sort of foolish, and he stares back vacant and helpless. Somehow we'd never been up against a proposition like this, and it had us fannin' the air.

"Unburied dead, eh?" says I. "Oh come, Mr. De Kay, ain't that drawin' it a little strong? Why, you ought to have lots of punch left in you yet. All you got to do is buck up."

"The optimism of youth!" says he. "I suppose I ought to feel grateful, Professor McCabe, for your well intentioned advice. And I can almost say that I wish I might——"

He don't get a chance to finish; for this is right where Hunk Burley, that I'd almost forgot was in the room, suddenly kicks into the debate. I'd felt one or two tugs at my coat; but this last one was so vigorous it nearly whirls me around. And as I turns I finds him blinkin' and splutterin' excited, like he'd swallowed his cigar.

"Eh?" says I. "What's troublin' you, Hunk?"

"He—he's the guy," says Hunk, "the very guy!"

"Wha-a-at?" says I, followin' the look in them wide-set pop eyes of his. "Who is?"

"Him," says he, pointin' to Cuyler. "He's a reg'lar guy, he is; the spit and image of what I been wantin' to connect with these last six months. Say, Shorty, put me next."

"Gwan!" says I. "You ain't supposed to exist. Paint your funnels black and run the blockade."

At which Cuyler, who has been starin' curious through his glasses, steps forward. "What is it?" says he. "Do I understand that the gentleman wishes to speak to me?"

"You're hootin'," says Hunk. "Only I ain't no gent. I'm just Hunk Burley, managin' producer. Tent shows is my line, ring or stage, and I'm carryin' a proposition up my cuff that means a lot of easy money to whoever grabs it first. Do you get me?"

"Ah, stow it, Hunk!" says I. "Mr. De Kay ain't one of your crowd. Can't you see he's——"

"But with him out front," breaks in Hunk eager, "and pullin' that swell line of patter, we could pack the reserved benches from dirt to canvas. Honest, we could! Say, Mister, lemme put it to you on the level. You buy in with me on this Great Australian Hippodrome, a half int'rest for twelve thou cash, leave me the transportation and talent end, while you do the polite gab at the main entrance, and if we don't lug away the daily receipts in sugar barrels I'll own the boxin' kangaroos for first cousins. Why, it's the chance of a lifetime! What do you say to it?"

And you should have seen the look on Cuyler Morrison's aristocratic map as he inspects Hunk up and down and it dawns on him that he's bein' invited to break into the circus business. But after the first shock has passed off he ends by smilin' indulgent.

"My good fellow," says he, "you flatter me. My qualifications for such a partnership are entirely too limited."

"If you mean you couldn't get away with it," says Hunk, "you got another guess. Why, in one forenoon I could coach you up for a spiel that would set 'em mobbin' the ticket wagons! And with you in a white silk lid drivin' four spotted ponies and leadin' the grand street parade—say they'd be lettin' out the schools for our matinees."

Out of the tail of my eye I could see that J. Bayard was speechless with indignation. But what could I do? The only way of stoppin' Hunk was to choke him, which wa'n't any pink tea proceedin'. Besides, Cuyler seems to be mildly entertained at it all.

"A fascinating picture, truly!" says he. "I have often envied those important personages at the head of street parades without ever dreaming that some day the opportunity might come to me of—— But alas! I have no twelve thousand to invest in such an estimable enterprise."

"Ah, quit your kiddin'!" says Hunk.

He wouldn't believe for a minute that Cuyler couldn't cash a check for twice that, wouldn't even listen to Mr. De Kay while he protests that really he's a poor man livin' on a government salary. Hunk knew better. The ribbon on the shell-rim eyeglasses had got him, too.

"Very well," laughs Cuyler, givin' up the attempt. "But I must insist that I have no surging ambition, at my time of life, to drive spotted ponies in public. In fact, I've no ambitions at all."

"Then that's just why you ought to hook up with me," says Hunk. "Wait until you've been out a week on the road; that'll be enough to get you interested. And take it from me, there ain't any game like it,—pilin' out of your berth at a new pitch every mornin', breakfast in the mess car on the sidin', strollin' out to the grounds and watchin' the pegs sunk, drivin' around town to take a glance at the paper display, formin' on for the parade, sizin' up the sidewalk crowds, and a couple of hours later seein' 'em collectin' from all sides around the big top; then at night, when you've had two big houses, to check up the receipts and figure out how much you are to the good. Say, don't make any mistake, that's livin'! It ain't layin' back easy and havin' things handed you on a platter: it's goin' out after what you want, your jaw set and your shoulders braced, and bringin' home the bacon."

Cuyler, he's still listenin' sort of amused; but he's inspectin' this crude specimen in front of him with a little more int'rest. He shakes his head though.

"I've no doubt the life is all you describe," says he. "However, it is not for me."

"Why not?" demands Hunk. "Didn't I just hear you tellin' how you was travelin' with a bunch of dead ones? Ain't stuck on it, are you? And the answer is, Come out of your trance. I take it you ain't anybody special where you are now; just one of the cogs. Buy in with me, and I'll make you the main belt. That's right! Say, I'll tell you what! We'll feature you on the four-sheets—De Kay & Co.'s Grand Australian Hippodrome. Your picture in a wreath of roses,—no, a horseshoe's better,—and we'll play up the show as a refined, educatin', moral exhibition. They'll believe it when they see you. You'll be the big noise, the man in front. You'll hear 'em passin' the tip along the curb as the parade swings by, 'That's him—Mr. De Kay!' And you'll be the one to receive the Mayor and his wife and show 'em to their arena box. Every day a new Mayor in a new town. And you'll know 'em all, and they'll know you. What! That'll be bein' somebody, eh?"

He'd stepped up, right in front of Cuyler, talkin' free and easy, as one man to another. But then he always was that way. Not fresh, you know, nor cocky; but just as if he was as good as anybody, and allowed everybody was as good as him. He's lookin' Mr. De Kay straight in between the eyes, good-natured but earnest, and all of a sudden he reaches out a big paw and slaps him folksy on the shoulder.

"Well, Brother," says he, "how about it?"

I don't know how it struck J. Bayard Steele, but as for me, right then and there I got wise to the fact that, in spite of the ear tufts and low-brow manners, Hunk Burley, man for man, would measure up with De Kay or anyone else; that is, within his limits. For he'd found his job. He was there with the goods!

The same thought must have hit Cuyler too. Couldn't help it. He was lookin' level into them steady eyes, hearin' that husky, even voice, and watchin' that calm, rugged face that had so much strength behind it. A party to depend on, to tie to. Anyway, something of the kind got him, got him hard.

"By George!" says he. "I—I wish I could!" And with that he gives Hunk the grip, quick and impulsive.

Which was when I developed this foolish idea. I looks over to J. Bayard and grins. Then I turns back to Cuyler. "Well, it can be fixed," says I.

"Eh?" says he. "I beg pardon?"

"Your bit from Pyramid's pile," says I. "If you'll take the chance of chuckin' your salary and quittin' the ranks of the unburied dead, we'll stake you to enough so you can buy in with Hunk. Won't we, Steele?"

J. Bayard gulps once or twice and looks sort of dazed. "If Mr. De Kay really wishes to connect himself with such a venture," says he, "of course I——"

"I do," breaks in Cuyler. "And I assure you, Gentlemen, that I feel more alive at this moment than I have for the last twenty years. My friend Burley here has done that. I want to go on feeling that way. I am willing to follow him anywhere."

"Then it's a go," says I. "Steele, write a voucher and I'll O.K. it."

"Good work!" says Hunk, givin' Cuyler another bone crushing grip. "And remember, we split fifty-fifty on all the net. I'll close the deal by to-morrow noon, and three weeks from to-day we open in Savannah."

Half an hour after they'd both gone J. Bayard still sits there gazin' vague and puzzled at the silver crook on his walkin' stick.

"Just fancy!" he mutters. "A circus!"

"Oh, well," says I, "maybe it's better to be keepin' step to 'Rockin' the Boat' than draggin' your heels along in the wake of the unburied dead."

One thing I'm sure of, Cuyler wa'n't indulgin' in any momentary fit. He meant business. I saw him last night, just as he was startin' for the steamer.

"How you and Hunk comin' on?" says I.

"Excellent!" says he. "We've made some compromises, naturally. For instance, he is to drive the spotted ponies, and I am to wear an ordinary black silk hat when I lead the street parade."



CHAPTER XIII

A FOLLOW THROUGH BY EGGY

Might have been a wrong hunch, as it turned out; but for awhile there what I wanted to do most was to take this Eggleston K. Ham, wad him up in a neat little lump, and stuff him into the waste basket. I wouldn't have been exertin' myself much, at that.

He's one of that kind, you know. Insignificant? Why, in full daylight you almost had to look twice to see him—and then you'd be guessin' whether it was a lath that had sprouted whiskers, or whiskers that was tryin' to bud a man! Them and the thick, gold-rimmed glasses sure did give him a comic, top-heavy look.

Course, we get all kinds in our buildin'; but when the lady voice culturist on the top floor sublets her studio for the summer to this freak I thought we'd gone from bad to worse. And she even has the nerve to leave the key with me, sayin' Mr. Ham would call for it in the course of a week or so.



We'd enjoyed about ten days of peace too, with no bloodcurdlin' sounds floatin' down the light shaft, and I was hopin' maybe the subtenant had renigged, when one mornin' the front office door opens easy, and in slips this face herbage exhibit. It's no scattered, hillside crop, either, but a full blown Vandyke. When he'd got through growin' the alfalfa, though, his pep seemed to give out, and the rest of him was as wispy as a schoolgirl.

He sidles up to the desk, where I have my heels elevated restful, and proceeds to make some throaty noises behind his hand. I'm just readin' how Tesreau pulled out of a bad hole in the seventh with two on bases; but I breaks away long enough to glance over the top of the paper.

"Go on, shoot it," says I.

"I—I'm very sorry," says he, "but—but I am Mr. Ham."

"Never mind apologizin'," says I. "Maybe it ain't all your fault. After the key, ain't you?"

"Yes, thank you," says he.

"Eggleston K., I suppose?" says I.

"Oh, yes," says he.

"Here you are, then, Eggy," says I, reachin' into a pigeonhole and producin' it. "What's your instrument of torture, the xylophone?"

"I—I beg pardon?" says he.

"Come now," says I, "don't tell me you're a trombone fiend!"

"Oh, I see," says he. "No, no, I—I'm not a musician."

"Shake, Eggy!" says I, reachin' out my hand impulsive. "And I don't care how many cubist pictures you paint up there so long as you ain't noisy about it."

He fingers his soft hat nervous, smiles sort of embarrassed, and remarks, "But—but I'm not an artist either, you know."

"Well, well!" says I. "Two misses, and still in the air. Is it anything you can speak of in public?"

"Why," says he, "I—I've said very little about it, as a matter of fact, but—but I am doing a little research work in—in anthropology."

"Good night!" says I. "Mixin' things up that's liable to blow the roof off, ain't it?"

"Why, no," says he, starin' at me puzzled. "It's merely studying racial characteristics, making comparisons, and so on. Incidentally, I—I'm writing a book, I suppose."

"Oh!" says I. "Authoring? Well, there's no law against it, and ink is cheap. Go to it, Eggy! Top floor, first door to your left."

And that seems to be the finish of the Ham incident. All was peaceful in the light shaft,—no squeaky high C's, no tump-tump-tump on the piano: just the faint tinkle of a typewriter bell now and then to remind us that Eggy was still there. Once in awhile I'd pass him on the stairs, and he'd nod bashful but friendly and then scuttle by like a rabbit.

"Must be a hot book he's writin'!" thinks I, and forgets his existence until the next time.

The summer moseys along, me bein' busy with this and that, goin' and comin' back, until here the other day when things is dullest Pinckney calls up from the club and announces that he's got a new customer for me, someone very special.

"Visitin' royalty, or what?" says I.

"Winthrop Hubbard," says he impressive.

"The guy that invented squash pie?" says I.

"No, no!" peeves Pinckney. "The son of Joshua Q. Hubbard, you know."

"I get you," says I. "The Boston cotton mill plute that come so near bitin' a chunk out of the new tariff bill. But I thought he was entertainin' the French Ambassador or someone at his Newport place?"

Well, he was; but this is only a flyin' trip. Seems Son Winthrop had fin'ly been persuaded to begin his business career by bein' made first vice president of the General Sales Company, that handled the export end of the trust's affairs. So, right in the height of his season, he's had to scratch his Horse Show entries, drop polo practice, and move into a measly six-room suite in one of them new Fifth-ave. hotels, with three hours of soul-wearin' officework ahead of him five days out of seven. He'd been at the grind a month now, and Mother had worried so about his health that Joshua Q. himself had come down to observe the awful results. Meanwhile Josh had been listenin' to Pinckney boostin' the Physical Culture Studio as the great restorer, and he'd been about persuaded that Son ought to take on something of the kind.

"But he wants to see you first," says Pinckney. "You understand. They're rather particular persons, the Hubbards,—fine old Plymouth stock, and all that."

"Me too," says I. "I'm just as fussy as the next—old Ellis Island stock, remember."

"Oh, bother!" says Pinckney. "Will you come up and meet him, or won't you?"

It wa'n't reg'lar; but as long as he's a friend of Pinckney's I said I would.

And, say, Joshua Q. looks the part, all right. One of these imposin', dignified, well kept old sports, with pink cheeks, a long, straight nose, and close-set, gray-blue eyes. They're the real crusty stuff, after all, them Back Bay plutes. For one thing, most of 'em have been at it longer. Take J. Q. Hubbard. Why, I expect he begun havin' his nails manicured before he was ten, and has had his own man to lay out his dinner clothes ever since he got into long pants.

Nothin' provincial about him, either. Takes his trip across every winter reg'lar, and I suppose he's as much at home on Unter den Linden, or the Place de Concord or Neva Prospect as he is on Tremont-st. And, sittin' there sippin' his hock and seltzer, gazin' languid out on Fifth-ave., he gives kind of a classy tone to one of the swellest clubs in New York. There ain't any snobbish frills to him, though. He gets right down to brass tacks.

"McCabe," says he, "what class of persons do you have as patrons."

"Why," says I, "mostly Wall Street men, with a sprinklin' of afternoon tea Johnnies, such as Pinckney here."

"No objectionable persons, I trust?" says he.

"Any roughneck gets the quick dump," says I.

"Ah, I think I catch your meaning," says he, "and I've no doubt your establishment can supply precisely what my son needs in the way of exercise. I suppose, however, I'd best see for myself. May we go now?"

"Sure," says I. "No special visitin' days."

"Then I'll 'phone Winthrop to meet us there," says he.

Seems he couldn't get Son direct; but he leaves word at his office, and then off we goes in Pinckney's limousine de luxe. It ain't often I worry any about the outside looks of things at the joint; but somehow, with this elegant old party comin' to inspect, I was kind of hopin' the stairs had been swept and that Swifty Joe wouldn't have any of his Red Hook friends callin' on him.

So I most gasps when we piles out in front of the studio and finds a mob that extends from the curb to the front door. Not only that, but the lower hall is crowded, and they line the stairs halfway up. And such a bunch! Waps, Dagoes, Matzers, Syrians, all varieties.

"By Jove, though!" says Pinckney. "What's all this?"

"Looks like someone was openin' a sweatshop in the buildin', don't it!" says I. "If that's so, here's where I break my lease."

"Really," says Mr. Hubbard, eyin' the crowd doubtful, "I hardly believe I care to——"

"Ah, I'll clear 'em out in two shakes," says I. "Just follow after me. Hey, you! Heim gagen. Mushong! Gangway, gangway!" and I motions threatenin'. "Ah, beat it, you garlic destroyers!" I sings out. "Back up there, and take your feet with you! Back, you fatheads!" and I sends one caromin' to the right and another spinnin' to the left.

The best I could do, though, was to open a three-foot lane through 'em, and there they stuck, lined up on either side like they was waitin' for a parade. It was something like that too,—me leadin' the way, Pinckney steerin' J. Q. by the arm. We'd got inside the doorway without a word bein' said, when a bright-eyed Dago girl with a rainbow-tinted handkerchief about her neck breaks the spell.

"Picture, Meester—take-a da picture?" says she pleadin'. With that the others breaks loose. "Picture, Meester! Please-a, Meester? Picture, picture!" They says it in all sorts of dialects, with all sorts of variations, all beggin' for the same thing. "Picture, picture!" They reaches out, grabbin' at our coat sleeves. Three of 'em had hold of J. Q. at once when I whirls on 'em.

"Ah, ditch the chorus!" I yells at 'em. "What do you think this is, anyway, a movie outfit? Get back there! Hands off, or I call the cops!"

It's strenuous work; but I manages to quiet 'em long enough for Pinckney and Mr. Hubbard to get through and slip up to the studio. Then I tries to shoo the bunch into the street; but they don't shoo for a cent. They still demands to have their pictures taken.

"Say, you Carlotta, there!" says I, singlin' out the Dago girl. "Who gave you this nutty picture hunch?"

"Why, Meester Hama," says she. "Nice-a man, Meester Hama."

"Is he?" says I. "Well, you wait here until I see him about this. Wait—understand?" With that I skips upstairs, and explains the mystery of our bein' mobbed. "It's a whiskered freak on the top floor they're after," says I. "Swifty, run up and get that Ham and Eggs gent. I'm yearnin' for speech with him. I don't know what this is all about; but I'll soon see, and block any encores."

"Quite right," says Mr. Hubbard. "This is all extremely annoying. Such a rabble!"

"Positively disgusting!" adds Pinckney. "A crowd of smelly foreigners! Shorty, you should put a stop to this."

"Trust me," says I. "Ah, here we have the guilty party!" and in comes Swifty towin' Eggleston K. by the collar. No wonder Eggy is some agitated, after bein' hauled down two flights in that fashion!

"Well," says I, as Swifty stands him up in front of us. "Who are your outside friends, and why?"

"My—my friends?" says he. "I—I don't understand. And I must protest, you know, against this manner of——"

"Gwan!" says I. "I'm doin' all the protestin' here. And I want to know what you mean by collectin' such a crowd of steerage junk that my customers can't get in without bein' mobbed? Howled for us to take their pictures, and mentioned your name."

"Oh! Pictures!" and Eggy seems to get the key. "Why, I—I'd forgotten."

"Can you beat that?" says I. "He'd forgotten! Well, they hadn't. But what's the idea, anyway? Collectin' fam'ly portraits of prominent gunmen, or what?"

"It—it's my way of getting material for my work," says Eggleston. "You see, through some friends in a settlement house, I get to know these people. I take snapshots of them for nothing. They like to send the pictures back home, you know, and I can use some of them myself."

"In the book?" says I.

"Perhaps," says Eggy, blushin'. "I had promised a few of them to take some studio pictures if they would come up to-day."

"And they didn't do a thing but bring all their friends," says I. "Must be fifty of them down there. You'll have a thick book before you get through."

"I beg pardon," puts in Mr. Hubbard, leanin' forward int'rested, "but may I ask the nature of the book?"

"It—it's to be about our foreign-born citizens," says Eggy.

"Ah, I see!" says J. Q. "Pointing out the evils of unrestricted immigration, I presume?"

"Well—er—not exactly," says Eggy.

"Then I should advise you to make it so," says Mr. Hubbard. "In fact, if the subject were well handled, and the case put strongly enough to meet my views, I think I could assure its immediate publication."

"Oh, would you?" says Eggleston, real eager. "But—but what are your views as to our treatment of aliens?"

"My programme is quite simple," says Mr. Hubbard. "I would stop all immigration at once, absolutely. Then I would deport all persons of foreign birth who had not become citizens."

Eggy gasped. "But—but that would be unjust!" says he. "Why, it would be monstrous! Surely, you are not in earnest?"

Mr. Hubbard's eyelids narrow, his jaw stiffens, and he emphasizes each word by tappin' his knee. "I'd like to see it done to-morrow," says he. "Check this flood of immigration, and you solve half of our economic and industrial problems. Too long we have allowed this country to be a general dumping ground for the scum of Europe. Everyone admits that."

"If you please," says Eggy, runnin' his fingers through his beard nervous, "I could not agree to that. On the contrary, my theory is that we owe a great deal of our progress and our success to the foreign born."

"Oh, indeed!" remarks Mr. Hubbard, cold and sharp. "And you mean to try to prove that in your book?"

"Something like that," admits Eggy.

"Then, Sir," goes on J. Q., "I must tell you that I consider you a most mischievous, if not dangerous person, and I feel it my duty to discourage such misdirected enterprise. Aren't you an instructor in economics under Professor Hartnett?"

Eggy pleads guilty.

"I thought I recognized the name," says J. Q. "Well, Mr. Ham, I am Joshua Q. Hubbard, and, as you may know, I happen to be one of the governing board of that college; so I warn you now, if you insist on publishing such a book as you have suggested, you may expect consequences."

For a minute that seems to stun Eggleston. He stares at Mr. Hubbard, blinkin' his eyes rapid and swallowin' hard. Then he appears to recover. "But—but are you not somewhat prejudiced?" says he. "I think I could show you, Sir, that these poor aliens——"

"Mr. Ham," says J. Q. decided, "I know exactly what I am talking about; not from hearsay, but from actual experience. Hundreds of thousands of dollars these wretched foreigners have cost me within the last few years. Why, that last big strike cut dividends almost in half! And who causes all the strikes, is at the bottom of all labor disturbances? The foreign element. If I had my way, I'd call out the regular army and drive every last one of them into the sea."

You'd most thought that would have squelched Eggy. I was lookin' for him to back through the door on his hands and knees. But all he does is stand there lookin' J. Q. Hubbard square in the eye and smilin' quiet.

"Yes, I've heard sentiments like that before," says he. "I presume, Mr. Hubbard, that you know many of your mill operatives personally?"

"No," says J. Q., "and I have no desire to. I haven't been inside one of our mills in fifteen years."

"I see," says Eggy. "You keep in touch with your employees through—er—your bankbook? But is it fair to judge them as men and women wholly on their ability to produce dividends for you?"

"As an employer of labor, what other test would you have me apply?" says J. Q.

"Then you are classing them with machines," says Eggy.

"No," says Mr. Hubbard. "I can depend upon my looms not to go on strike."

"But you own your looms," says Eggleston. "Your loom tenders are human beings."

"When they mob strike breakers they behave more like wild animals, and then you've got to treat 'em as such," raps back J. Q.

"Are you quite certain that the standards of humanity you set up are just?" asks Eggy. "You know people are beginning to question your absolute right to fix arbitrarily the hours and wages and conditions of labor. They are suggesting that your mills produce tuberculosis as well as cloth. They are showing that, in your eagerness for dividends, you work women and children too long, and that you don't pay them a living wage."

"Rot!" snorts J. Q. "These are all the mushy theories of sentimentalists. What else are these foreigners good for?"

"Ah, there you get to it!" says Eggy. "Aren't they too valuable to be ground up in your dusty mills? Can they not be made into useful citizens?"

"No, they can't," snaps Mr. Hubbard. "It's been tried too often. Look at the results. Who fill our jails? Foreigners! Who swarm in our filthy city slums? Foreigners! They are the curse of this country. Look at the wretched mob you have brought about your heels to-day, those outside there. There's a sample."

"If you only would look and understand!" says Eggleston. "Won't you—now? It will take only a little of your time, and I'll promise to keep them in order. Oh, if you'd only let me!"

"Let you what?" demands J. Q., starin' puzzled.

"Introduce a few of them to you properly," says Eggy; "only four or five. Come, a handful of simple-minded peasants can't hurt you. They're poor, and ignorant, and not especially clean, I'll admit; but I'll keep them at a proper distance. You see, I want to show you something about them. Of course, you're afraid you'll lose your cherished prejudices——"

"I'm afraid of nothing of the sort," breaks in Mr. Hubbard. "Go on. Have 'em up, if McCabe is willing."

"Eh?" says I. "Bring that mob up here?"

"Just a few," pleads Eggy, "and for ten minutes only."

"It might be sport," suggests Pinckney.

"I'll take a chance," says I. "We can disinfect afterwards."

Eggy dashes off, and after a lively jabberin' below comes back with his selected specimens. Not a one looks as though he'd been over more'n a year, and some are still wearin' the outlandish rigs they landed in. Then Eggy begins introducin' 'em. And, say, you'd hardly know him for the same bashful, wispy party that Swifty had dragged in a little while before. Honest, as he warms to it, he sort of swells up and straightens, he squares his shoulders, his voice rings out confident, and his eyes behind the thick glasses are all aglow.

"We will dispense with names," says he; "but here is a native of Sicily. He is about thirty-five years old, and he worked in the salt mines for something like twelve cents a day from the time he was ten until he came over here under contract to a padrone a few months ago. So you see his possibilities for mental development have been limited. But his muscles have been put to use in helping dig a new subway for us. We hope, however, that in the future his latent talents may be brought out. That being the case, he is possibly the grandfather of the man who in 1965 will write for us an American opera better than anything ever produced by Verdi. Why not?"

We gawps at the grandfather of the musical genius of 1965 and grins. He's a short, squatty, low-browed party with gold rings in his ears and a smallpox-pitted face. He gazes doubtful at Eggleston durin' the talk, and at the finish grins back at us. Likely he thought Eggy'd been makin' a comic speech.

"An ingenious prophecy," says Mr. Hubbard; "but unfortunately all Italians are not Verdis."

"Few have the chance to be," says Eggy. "That is what America should mean to them,—opportunity. We shall benefit by giving it to them too. Look at our famous bands: at least one-third Italians. Why, nine-tenths of the music that delights us is made for us by the foreign born! Would you drive all those into the sea?"

"Absurd!" says Mr. Hubbard. "I referred only to the lower classes, of course. But let's get on. What next?"

Eggy looks over the line, picks out a square-jawed, bull-headed, pie-faced Yon Yonson, with stupid, stary, skim-milk eyes, and leads him to the front. "A direct descendant of the old Vikings," says he, "a fellow countryman of the heroic Stefansson, of Amundsen. Just now he works as a longshoreman. But give him a fair chance, and his son's son will turn out to be the first Admiral of the Federal Fleet of Commerce that is to be,—a fleet of swift government freighters that shall knit closely together our ports with all the ports of the Seven Seas. Gentlemen, I present to you the ancestor of an Admiral!"

Pinckney chuckles and nudges Mr. Hubbard. Yonson bats his stupid eyes once or twice, and lets himself be pushed back.

"Go on," says J. Q., scowlin'. "I suppose you'll produce next the grandfather of a genius who will head the National Pie Bureau of the next century?"

"Not precisely," says Eggy, beckonin' up a black-haired, brown-eyed Polish Jewess. "A potential grandmother this time. She helps an aunt who conducts a little kosher delicatessen shop in a Hester-st. basement. Her granddaughter is to organize the movement for communal dietetics, by means of which our children's children are all to be fed on properly cooked food, scientifically prepared, and delivered hot at a nominal price. She will banish dyspepsia from the land, make obsolete the household drudge, and eliminate the antique kitchen from twenty million homes. Perhaps they will put up a statue in her memory."

"Humph!" snorts Mr. Hubbard. "Is that one of H. G. Wells' silly dreams?"

"You flatter me," says Eggy; "but you give me courage to venture still further. Now we come to the Slav." He calls up a thin, peak-nosed, wild-eyed gink who's wearin' a greasy waiter's coat and a coffee-stained white shirt. "From a forty-cent table d'hote restaurant," goes on Eggleston. "An alert, quick-moving, deft-handed person—valuable qualities, you will admit. Develop those in his grandson, give him the training of a National Academy of Technical Arts, bring out the repressed courage and self-confidence, and you will produce—well, let us say, the Chief Pilot of the Aero Transportation Department, the man to whom Congress will vote an honorary pension for winning the first Washington-to-Buenos Ayres race in a three-hundred-foot Lippmann Stabilized quadroplane, carrying fifty passengers and two tons of mail and baggage."

Mr. Hubbard gazes squint-eyed at the waiter and sniffs.

"Come, now, who knows?" insists Eggy. "These humble people whom you so despise need only an opportunity. Can we afford to shut them out? Don't we need them as much as they need us?"

"Mr. Ham," says J. Q., shuttin' his jaws grim, "my motto is, 'America for Americans!'"

"And mine," says Eggy, facin' him defiant, "is 'Americans for America!'"

"You're a scatterbrained visionary!" snaps J. Q. "You and your potential grandfather rubbish! What about the grandsons of good Americans? Do you not reckon them in at all in your——"

"Whe-e-e-e! Whoop!" comes from the hall, the front office door is kicked open joyous, and in comes a tall, light-haired, blue-eyed young gent, with his face well pinked up and his hat on the back of his head. He's arm in arm with a shrimpy, Frenchy lookin' party wearin' a silk lid and a frock coat. They pushes unsteady through Eggy's illustrious ancestor bunch and comes to parade rest in the center of the stage.

"Winthrop!" gasps Mr. Hubbard.

"Eh?" gasps the young gent, starin' round uncertain until he locates J. Q. Then he makes a stab at straightenin' up. "'S a' right, Governor," he goes on, "'s a' right. Been givin' lil' lu-luncheon to for'n rep'sen'tives. Put 'em all out but An-Andorvski, and he's nothing but a fish—deuced Russian fish. Eh, Droski?"

Believe me, with J. Q. Hubbard turnin' purple in the gills, and all them cheap foreigners lookin' on bug-eyed, it wa'n't any humorous scene. With the help of the waiter and the longshoreman they loads Winthrop and his friend into a taxi, and Pinckney starts with 'em for the nearest Turkish bath. The grandfather debate is adjourned for good.

I was talkin' it over with Swifty Joe, who, havin' been born in County Kerry and brought up in South Brooklyn, is sore on foreigners of all kinds. Course, he sides hearty with Mr. Hubbard.

"Ahr-r-r-chee!" says he. "That Hamand boob, stickin' up for the Waps and Guineas, he—he's a nut, a last year's nut!"

"Hardly that, Swifty," says I. "A next year's nut, I should say."



CHAPTER XIV

CATCHING UP WITH GERALD

"It seemed so absurdly simple at first too," says J. Bayard Steele, tappin' one of his pearl-gray spats with his walkin' stick. "But now—well, the more I see of this Gerald Webb, the less I understand."

"Then you're comin' on," says I. "In time you'll get wise to the fact that everybody's that way,—no two alike and every last one of us neither all this nor all that, but constructed complicated, with a surprise package done up in each one."

"Ah! Some of your homespun philosophy, eh?" says J. Bayard. "Interesting perhaps, but inaccurate—quite! The fellow is not at all difficult to read: it's what we ought to do for him that is puzzling."

Which gives you a line, I expect, on this little debate of ours. Yep! Gerald is No. 8 on Pyramid Gordon's list. He'd been a private secretary for Mr. Gordon at one time or another; but he'd been handed his passports kind of abrupt one mornin', and had been set adrift in a cold world without warnin'.

"In fact," goes on Steele, "I am told that Gordon actually kicked him out of his office; in rather a public manner too."

"Huh!" says I. "I expect he deserved it, then."

"Not at all," says Steele. "I've looked that point up. It was over a letter which Gordon himself had dictated to Webb not forty-eight hours before; you know, one of his hot-headed, arrogant, go-to-blazes retorts, during the thick of a fight. But this happened to be in reply to an ultimatum from the Reamur-Brooks Syndicate, and by next morning he'd discovered that he was in no position to talk that way to them. Well, as you know, Pyramid Gordon wasn't the man to eat his own words."

"No," says I, "that wa'n't his fav'rite diet. So he made Gerald the goat, eh?"

"Precisely!" says Steele. "Called him in before the indignant delegation, headed by old Reamur himself, and demanded of poor Webb what he meant by sending out such a letter. The youngster was so flustered that he could only stammer a confused denial. He started sniveling. Then Gordon collared him and booted him into the corridor. That should have closed the incident, but a few moments later back comes Webb, blubbering like a whipped schoolboy, and perfectly wild with rage. He was armed with a mop that he'd snatched from an astonished scrubwoman, and he stormed in whimpering that he was going to kill Gordon. Absurd, of course. A mop isn't a deadly weapon. Some of the clerks promptly rushed in and held Webb until an officer could be called. Then Pyramid laughed it off and refused to prosecute. But the story got into the papers, you may remember; and while more or less fun was poked at Gordon, young Webb came in for a good share. And naturally his career as a private secretary ended right there."

"Yes," says I. "If I was takin' on a secretary myself, I wouldn't pick one that was subject to fits of mop wieldin'. What happened to him after that? How low did he fall?"

J. Bayard tosses over a fancy business card printed in three colors and carryin' this inscription in old English letterin':

AT THE SIGN OF THE BRASS CANDLESTICK Tea Room and Gift Shop Mr. Gerald Webb, Manager.

"Oh, well," says I, "that ain't so bad. Must have run across a backer somewhere."

"His sisters," says Steele. "He has five, and some of the four married ones are quite well to do. Then there is Evelyn, the old maid sister, who went in with him. It's from her I've found out so much about Gerald. Nice, refined, pleasant old maid; although somewhat plain featured. She tells me they have a shop at some seashore resort in summer,—Atlantic City, or the Pier,—and occasionally have quite a successful season. Then in the fall they open up again here. The last two summers, though, they've barely made expenses, and she fears that Gerald is becoming discouraged."

"Well, what you beefin' about?" says I. "There's your chance, ain't it? Jump in and cheer him up. Go round every day and drink yourself full of tea. Lug along your friends—anything. Got the whole Gordon estate back of you, you know. And it's plain Pyramid had in mind squarin' accounts for that raw deal he handed Gerald years back, or he wouldn't have named him in the will. And if your dope is right, I judge there ought to be something nice comin' to him."

"Of course, of course," says Steele. "But you see, McCabe, as an expert in altruism, I have reached the point where I no longer act hastily on crude conclusions. Possibly you will fail to understand, but now I take a certain pride in doing just the right thing in exactly the right way."

"I knew you was developin' into some variety of nut," says I. "So that's it, eh? Well, go on."

J. Bayard smiles indulgent and shrugs his shoulders. "For instance," says he, "this Gerald Webb seems to be one of those highly sensitive, delicately organized persons; somewhat effeminate in fact. He needs considerate, judicious handling."

"Then why not present him with an inlaid dressin' table and a set of eyebrow pencils?" I suggest.

Steele brushes that little persiflage aside too. "He's no doubt an idealist of some sort," says he, "a man with high hopes, ambitions. If I only knew what they were——"

"Ain't tried askin' him, have you?" says I.

"Certainly not!" says J. Bayard. "Those are things which such persons can rarely be induced to talk about. I've been studying him at close range, however, by dropping in now and then for a cup of tea and incidentally a chat with his sister; but to no effect. I can't seem to make him out. And I was wondering, Shorty, if you, in your rough and ready way——"

"P.O.F.!" I breaks in.

"What?" says Steele.

"Please omit floral tributes," says I. "You was wonderin' if I couldn't what—size him up for you?"

"Just that," says J. Bayard. "While your methods are not always of the subtlest, I must concede that at times your—er—native intuition——"

"Top floor—all out!" I breaks in. "You mean I can do a quick frame-up without feelin' the party's bumps or consultin' the cards? Maybe I can. But I ain't strong for moochin' around these oolong joints among the draped tunics and vanity boxes."

He's a persistent party, though, J. Bayard is, and after he's guaranteed that we won't run into any mob of shoppers this late in the day, and urged me real hard, I consents to trail along with him and pass on Gerald.

One of the usual teashop joints, the Brass Candlestick is, tucked away in a dwelling house basement on a side street about half a block east of Fifth avenue, with a freaky sign over the door and a pair of moultin' bay trees at the entrance. Inside we finds a collection of little white tables with chairs to match, a showcase full of arty jew'lry, and some shelves loaded with a job lot of odd-shaped vases and jugs and teapots and such truck.