TALES FROM THE JAZZ AGE

BY

F. SCOTT FITZGERALD

1922

A TABLE OF CONTENTS

MY LAST FLAPPERS

THE JELLY-BEAN

This is a Southern story, with the scene laid in the small Lily ofTarleton, Georgia. I have a profound affection for Tarleton, butsomehow whenever I write a story about it I receive letters from allover the South denouncing me in no uncertain terms. "The Jelly-Bean, "published in "The Metropolitan, " drew its full share of theseadmonitory notes. 

It was written under strange circumstances shortly after my firstnovel was published, and, moreover, it was the first story in which Ihad a collaborator. For, finding that I was unable to manage thecrap-shooting episode, I turned it over to my wife, who, as a Southerngirl, was presumably an expert on the technique and terminology ofthat great sectional pastime. 

THE CAMEL'S BACK

I suppose that of all the stories I have ever written this one cost methe least travail and perhaps gave me the most amusement. As to thelabor involved, it was written during one day in the city of NewOrleans, with the express purpose of buying a platinum and diamondwrist watch which cost six hundred dollars. I began it at seven in themorning and finished it at two o'clock the same night. It waspublished in the "Saturday Evening Post" in 1920, and later includedin the O. Henry Memorial Collection for the same year. I like it leastof all the stories in this volume. 

My amusement was derived from the fact that the camel part of thestory is literally true; in fact, I have a standing engagement withthe gentleman involved to attend the next fancy-dress party to whichwe are mutually invited, attired as the latter part of the camel--thisas a sort of atonement for being his historian. 

MAY DAY. 

This somewhat unpleasant tale, published as a novelette in the "SmartSet" in July, 1920, relates a series of events which took place in thespring of the previous year. Each of the three events made a greatimpression upon me. In life they were unrelated, except by the generalhysteria of that spring which inaugurated the Age of Jazz, but in mystory I have tried, unsuccessfully I fear, to weave them into apattern--a pattern which would give the effect of those months in NewYork as they appeared to at least one member of what was then theyounger generation. 

PORCELAIN AND PINK. 

"And do you write for any other magazines?" inquired the young lady. 

"Oh, yes, " I assured her. "I've had some stories and plays in the'Smart Set, ' for instance------"

The young lady shivered. 

"The 'Smart Set'!" she exclaimed. "How can you? Why, they publishstuff about girls in blue bathtubs, and silly things like that"

And I had the magnificent joy of telling her that she was referring to"Porcelain and Pink, " which had appeared there several months before. 

FANTASIES

THE DIAMOND AS BIG AS THE RITZ. 

These next stories are written in what, were I of imposing stature, Ishould call my "second manner. " "The Diamond as Big as the Ritz, "which appeared last summer in the "Smart Set, " was designed utterlyfor my own amusement. I was in that familiar mood characterized by aperfect craving for luxury, and the story began as an attempt to feedthat craving on imaginary foods. 

One well-known critic has been pleased to like this extravaganzabetter than anything I have written. Personally I prefer "The OffshorePirate. " But, to tamper slightly with Lincoln: If you like this sortof thing, this, possibly, is the sort of thing you'll like. 

THE CURIOUS CASE OF BENJAMIN BUTTON. 

This story was inspired by a remark of Mark Twain's to the effect thatit was a pity that the best part of life came at the beginning and theworst part at the end. By trying the experiment upon only one man in aperfectly normal world I have scarcely given his idea a fair trial. Several weeks after completing it, I discovered an almost identicalplot in Samuel Butler's "Note-books. "

The story was published in "Collier's" last summer and provoked thisstartling letter from an anonymous admirer in Cincinnati:

"Sir--

I have read the story Benjamin Button in Colliers and I wish to saythat as a short story writer you would make a good lunatic I have seenmany peices of cheese in my life but of all the peices of cheese Ihave ever seen you are the biggest peice. I hate to waste a peice ofstationary on you but I will. "

TARQUIN OF CHEAPSIDE. 

Written almost six years ago, this story is a product of undergraduatedays at Princeton. Considerably revised, it was published in the"Smart Set" in 1921. At the time of its conception I had but oneidea--to be a poet--and the fact that I was interested in the ring ofevery phrase, that I dreaded the obvious in prose if not in plot, shows throughout. Probably the peculiar affection I feel for itdepends more upon its age than upon any intrinsic merit. 

"O RUSSET WITCH!"

When this was written I had just completed the first draft of mysecond novel, and a natural reaction made me revel in a story whereinnone of the characters need be taken seriously. And I'm afraid that Iwas somewhat carried away by the feeling that there was no orderedscheme to which I must conform. After due consideration, however, Ihave decided to let it stand as it is, although the reader may findhimself somewhat puzzled at the time element. I had best say thathowever the years may have dealt with Merlin Grainger, I myself wasthinking always in the present. It was published in the"Metropolitan. "

UNCLASSIFIED MASTERPIECES

THE LEES OF HAPPINESS. 

Of this story I can say that it came to me in an irresistible form, crying to be written. It will be accused perhaps of being a mere pieceof sentimentality, but, as I saw it, it was a great deal more. If, therefore, it lacks the ring of sincerity, or even, of tragedy, thefault rests not with the theme but with my handling of it. 

It appeared in the "Chicago Tribune, " and later obtained, I believe, the quadruple gold laurel leaf or some such encomium from one of theanthologists who at present swarm among us. The gentleman I refer toruns as a rule to stark melodramas with a volcano or the ghost of JohnPaul Jones in the role of Nemesis, melodramas carefully disguised byearly paragraphs in Jamesian manner which hint dark and subtlecomplexities to follow. On this order:

"The case of Shaw McPhee, curiously enough, had no hearing on thealmost incredible attitude of Martin Sulo. This is parenthetical and, to at least three observers, whose names for the present I mustconceal, it seems improbable, etc. , etc. , etc. , " until the poor rat offiction is at last forced out into the open and the melodrama begins. 

MR. ICKY

This has the distinction of being the only magazine piece ever writtenin a New York hotel. The business was done in a bedroom in theKnickerbocker, and shortly afterward that memorable hostelry closedits doors forever. 

When a fitting period of mourning had elapsed it was published in the"Smart Set. "

JEMINA. 

Written, like "Tarquin of Cheapside, " while I was at Princeton, thissketch was published years later in "Vanity Fair. " For its technique Imust apologize to Mr. Stephen Leacock. 

I have laughed over it a great deal, especially when I first wrote it, but I can laugh over it no longer. Still, as other people tell me itis amusing, I include it here. It seems to me worth preserving a fewyears--at least until the ennui of changing fashions suppresses me, mybooks, and it together. 

With due apologies for this impossible Table of Contents, I tenderthese tales of the Jazz Age into the hands of those who read as theyrun and run as they read. 

MY LAST FLAPPERS

THE JELLY-BEAN. 

Jim Powell was a Jelly-bean. Much as I desire to make him an appealingcharacter, I feel that it would be unscrupulous to deceive you on thatpoint. He was a bred-in-the-bone, dyed-in-the-wool, ninety-ninethree-quarters per cent Jelly-bean and he grew lazily all duringJelly-bean season, which is every season, down in the land of theJelly-beans well below the Mason-Dixon line. 

Now if you call a Memphis man a Jelly-bean he will quite possibly pulla long sinewy rope from his hip pocket and hang you to a convenienttelegraph-pole. If you Call a New Orleans man a Jelly-bean he willprobably grin and ask you who is taking your girl to the Mardi Grasball. The particular Jelly-bean patch which produced the protagonistof this history lies somewhere between the two--a little city of fortythousand that has dozed sleepily for forty thousand years in southernGeorgia occasionally stirring in its slumbers and muttering somethingabout a war that took place sometime, somewhere, and that everyoneelse has forgotten long ago. 

Jim was a Jelly-bean. I write that again because it has such apleasant sound--rather like the beginning of a fairy story--as if Jimwere nice. It somehow gives me a picture of him with a round, appetizing face and all sort of leaves and vegetables growing out ofhis cap. But Jim was long and thin and bent at the waist from stoopingover pool-tables, and he was what might have been known in theindiscriminating North as a corner loafer. "Jelly-bean" is the namethroughout the undissolved Confederacy for one who spends his lifeconjugating the verb to idle in the first person singular--I amidling, I have idled, I will idle. 

Jim was born in a white house on a green corner, It had fourweather-beaten pillars in front and a great amount of lattice-work inthe rear that made a cheerful criss-cross background for a flowerysun-drenched lawn. Originally the dwellers in the white house hadowned the ground next door and next door to that and next door tothat, but this had been so long ago that even Jim's father, scarcelyremembered it. He had, in fact, thought it a matter of so littlemoment that when he was dying from a pistol wound got in a brawl heneglected even to tell little Jim, who was five years old andmiserably frightened. The white house became a boarding-house run by atight-lipped lady from Macon, whom Jim called Aunt Mamie and detestedwith all his soul. 

He became fifteen, went to high school, wore his hair in black snarls, and was afraid of girls. He hated his home where four women and oneold man prolonged an interminable chatter from summer to summer aboutwhat lots the Powell place had originally included and what sorts offlowers would be out next. Sometimes the parents of little girls intown, remembering Jim's. Mother and fancying a resemblance in the darkeyes and hair, invited him to parties, but parties made him shy and hemuch preferred sitting on a disconnected axle in Tilly's Garage, rolling the bones or exploring his mouth endlessly with a long straw. For pocket money, he picked up odd jobs, and it was due to this thathe stopped going to parties. At his third party little Marjorie Haighthad whispered indiscreetly and within hearing distance that he was aboy who brought the groceries sometimes. So instead of the two-stepand polka, Jim had learned to throw, any number he desired on the diceand had listened to spicy tales of all the shootings that had occurredin the surrounding country during the past fifty years. 

He became eighteen. The war broke out and he enlisted as a gob andpolished brass in the Charleston Navy-yard for a year. Then, by way ofvariety, he went North and polished brass in the Brooklyn Navy-yardfor a year. 

When the war was over he came home, He was twenty-one, has trouserswere too short and too tight. His buttoned shoes were long and narrow. His tie was an alarming conspiracy of purple and pink marvellouslyscrolled, and over it were two blue eyes faded like a piece of verygood old cloth, long exposed to the sun. 

In the twilight of one April evening when a soft gray had drifted downalong the cottonfields and over the sultry town, he was a vague figureleaning against a board fence, whistling and gazing at the moon's rimabove the lights of Jackson Street. His mind was working persistentlyon a problem that had held his attention for an. The Jelly-bean hadbeen invited to a party. 

Back in the days when all the boys had detested all the girls, ClarkDarrow and Jim had sat side by side in school. But, while Jim's socialaspirations had died in the oily air of the garage, Clark hadalternately fallen in and out of love, gone to college, taken todrink, given it up, and, in short, become one of the best beaux of thetown. Nevertheless Clark and Jim had retained a friendship that, though casual, was perfectly definite. That afternoon Clark's ancientFord had slowed up beside Jim, who was on the sidewalk and, out of aclear sky, Clark invited him to a party at the country club. Theimpulse that made him do this was no stranger than the impulse whichmade Jim accept. The latter was probably an unconscious ennui, ahalf-frightened sense of adventure. And now Jim was soberly thinkingit over. 

He began to sing, drumming his long foot idly on a stone block in thesidewalk till it wobbled up and down in time to the low throaty tune:

 "One smile from Home in Jelly-bean town, Lives Jeanne, the Jelly-bean Queen. She loves her dice and treats 'em nice; No dice would treat her mean. "

He broke off and agitated the sidewalk to a bumpy gallop. 

"Daggone!" he muttered, half aloud. They would all be there--the oldcrowd, the crowd to which, by right of the white house, sold longsince, and the portrait of the officer in gray over the mantel, Jimshould have belonged. But that crowd had grown up together into atight little set as gradually as the girls' dresses had lengthenedinch by inch, as definitely as the boys' trousers had dropped suddenlyto their ankles. And to that society of first names and dead puppyloves Jim was an outsider--a running mate of poor whites. Most of themen knew him, condescendingly; he tipped his hat to three or fourgirls. That was all. 

When the dusk had thickened into a blue setting for the moon, hewalked through the hot, pleasantly pungent town to Jackson Street. Thestores were closing and the last shoppers were drifting homeward, asif borne on the dreamy revolution of a slow merry-go-round. Astreet-fair farther down a brilliant alley of varicolored booths andcontributed a blend of music to the night--an oriental dance on acalliope, a melancholy bugle in front of a freak show, a cheerfulrendition of "Back Home in Tennessee" on a hand-organ. 

The Jelly-bean stopped in a store and bought a collar. Then hesauntered along toward Soda Sam's, where he found the usual three orfour cars of a summer evening parked in front and the little darkiesrunning back and forth with sundaes and lemonades. 

"Hello, Jim. "

It was a voice at his elbow--Joe Ewing sitting in an automobile withMarylyn Wade. Nancy Lamar and a strange man were in the back seat. 

The Jelly-bean tipped his hat quickly. 

"Hi Ben--" then, after an almost imperceptible pause--"How y' all?"

Passing, he ambled on toward the garage where he had a room up-stairs. His "How y'all" had been said to Nancy Lamar, to whom he had notspoken in fifteen years. 

Nancy had a mouth like a remembered kiss and shadowy eyes andblue-black hair inherited from her mother who had been born inBudapest. Jim passed her often on the street, walking small-boyfashion with her hands in her pockets and he knew that with herinseparable Sally Carrol Hopper she had left a trail of broken heartsfrom Atlanta to New Orleans. 

For a few fleeting moments Jim wished he could dance. Then he laughedand as he reached his door began to sing softly to himself:

 "Her Jelly Roll can twist your soul, Her eyes are big and brown, She's the Queen of the Queens of the Jelly-beans-- My Jeanne of Jelly-bean Town. "

II

At nine-thirty, Jim and Clark met in front of Soda Sam's and startedfor the Country Club in Clark's Ford. "Jim, " asked Clark casually, asthey rattled through the jasmine-scented night, "how do you keepalive?"

The Jelly-bean paused, considered. 

"Well, " he said finally, "I got a room over Tilly's garage. I help himsome with the cars in the afternoon an' he gives it to me free. Sometimes I drive one of his taxies and pick up a little thataway. Iget fed up doin' that regular though. "

"That all?"

"Well, when there's a lot of work I help him by the day--Saturdaysusually--and then there's one main source of revenue I don't generallymention. Maybe you don't recollect I'm about the champion crap-shooterof this town. They make me shoot from a cup now because once I get thefeel of a pair of dice they just roll for me. "

Clark grinned appreciatively, "I never could learn to set 'em so's they'd do what I wanted. Wishyou'd shoot with Nancy Lamar some day and take all her money away fromher. She will roll 'em with the boys and she loses more than her daddycan afford to give her. I happen to know she sold a good ring lastmonth to pay a debt. "

The Jelly-bean was noncommittal. 

"The white house on Elm Street still belong to you?"

Jim shook his head. 

"Sold. Got a pretty good price, seein' it wasn't in a good part oftown no more. Lawyer told me to put it into Liberty bonds. But AuntMamie got so she didn't have no sense, so it takes all the interest tokeep her up at Great Farms Sanitarium. 

"Hm. "

"I got an old uncle up-state an' I reckin I kin go up there if ever Iget sure enough pore. Nice farm, but not enough niggers around to workit. He's asked me to come up and help him, but I don't guess I'd takemuch to it. Too doggone lonesome--" He broke off suddenly. "Clark, Iwant to tell you I'm much obliged to you for askin' me out, but I'd bea lot happier if you'd just stop the car right here an' let me walkback into town. "

"Shucks!" Clark grunted. "Do you good to step out. You don't have todance--just get out there on the floor and shake. "

"Hold on, " exclaimed. Jim uneasily, "Don't you go leadin' me up to anygirls and leavin' me there so I'll have to dance with 'em. "

Clark laughed. 

"'Cause, " continued Jim desperately, "without you swear you won't dothat I'm agoin' to get out right here an' my good legs goin' carry meback to Jackson street. "

They agreed after some argument that Jim, unmolested by females, wasto view the spectacle from a secluded settee in the corner where Clarkwould join him whenever he wasn't dancing. 

So ten o'clock found the Jelly-bean with his legs crossed and his armsconservatively folded, trying to look casually at home and politelyuninterested in the dancers. At heart he was torn between overwhelmingself-consciousness and an intense curiosity as to all that went onaround him. He saw the girls emerge one by one from the dressing-room, stretching and pluming themselves like bright birds, smiling overtheir powdered shoulders at the chaperones, casting a quick glancearound to take in the room and, simultaneously, the room's reaction totheir entrance--and then, again like birds, alighting and nestling inthe sober arms of their waiting escorts. Sally Carrol Hopper, blondeand lazy-eyed, appeared clad in her favorite pink and blinking like anawakened rose. Marjorie Haight, Marylyn Wade, Harriet Cary, all thegirls he had seen loitering down Jackson Street by noon, now, curledand brilliantined and delicately tinted for the overhead lights, weremiraculously strange Dresden figures of pink and blue and red andgold, fresh from the shop and not yet fully dried. 

He had been there half an hour, totally uncheered by Clark's jovialvisits which were each one accompanied by a "Hello, old boy, how youmaking out?" and a slap at his knee. A dozen males had spoken to himor stopped for a moment beside him, but he knew that they were eachone surprised at finding him there and fancied that one or two wereeven slightly resentful. But at half past ten his embarrassmentsuddenly left him and a pull of breathless interest took himcompletely out of himself--Nancy Lamar had come out of thedressing-room. 

She was dressed in yellow organdie, a costume of a hundred coolcorners, with three tiers of ruffles and a big bow in back until sheshed black and yellow around her in a sort of phosphorescent lustre. The Jelly-bean's eyes opened wide and a lump arose in his throat. Forshe stood beside the door until her partner hurried up. Jim recognizedhim as the stranger who had been with her in Joe Ewing's car thatafternoon. He saw her set her arms akimbo and say something in a lowvoice, and laugh. The man laughed too and Jim experienced the quickpang of a weird new kind of pain. Some ray had passed between thepair, a shaft of beauty from that sun that had warmed him a momentsince. The Jelly-bean felt suddenly like a weed in a shadow. 

A minute later Clark approached him, bright-eyed and glowing. 

"Hi, old man" he cried with some lack of originality. "How you makingout?"

Jim replied that he was making out as well as could be expected. 

"You come along with me, " commanded Clark. "I've got something that'llput an edge on the evening. "

Jim followed him awkwardly across the floor and up the stairs to thelocker-room where Clark produced a flask of nameless yellow liquid. 

"Good old corn. "

Ginger ale arrived on a tray. Such potent nectar as "good old corn"needed some disguise beyond seltzer. 

"Say, boy, " exclaimed Clark breathlessly, "doesn't Nancy Lamar lookbeautiful?"

Jim nodded. 

"Mighty beautiful, " he agreed. 

"She's all dolled up to a fare-you-well to-night, " continued Clark. "Notice that fellow she's with?"

"Big fella? White pants?"

"Yeah. Well, that's Ogden Merritt from Savannah. Old man Merritt makesthe Merritt safety razors. This fella's crazy about her. Been chasing, after her all year. 

"She's a wild baby, " continued Clark, "but I like her. So doeseverybody. But she sure does do crazy stunts. She usually gets outalive, but she's got scars all over her reputation from one thing oranother she's done. "

"That so?" Jim passed over his glass. "That's good corn. "

"Not so bad. Oh, she's a wild one. Shoot craps, say, boy! And she dolike her high-balls. Promised I'd give her one later on. "

"She in love with this--Merritt?"

"Damned if I know. Seems like all the best girls around here marryfellas and go off somewhere. "

He poured himself one more drink and carefully corked the bottle. 

"Listen, Jim, I got to go dance and I'd be much obliged if you juststick this corn right on your hip as long as you're not dancing. If aman notices I've had a drink he'll come up and ask me and before Iknow it it's all gone and somebody else is having my good time. "

So Nancy Lamar was going to marry. This toast of a town was to becomethe private property of an individual in white trousers--and allbecause white trousers' father had made a better razor than hisneighbor. As they descended the stairs Jim found the idea inexplicablydepressing. For the first time in his life he felt a vague andromantic yearning. A picture of her began to form in hisimagination--Nancy walking boylike and debonnaire along the street, taking an orange as tithe from a worshipful fruit-dealer, charging adope on a mythical account, at Soda Sam's, assembling a convoy ofbeaux and then driving off in triumphal state for an afternoon ofsplashing and singing. 

The Jelly-bean walked out on the porch to a deserted corner, darkbetween the moon on the lawn and the single lighted door of theballroom. There he found a chair and, lighting a cigarette, driftedinto the thoughtless reverie that was his usual mood. Yet now it was areverie made sensuous by the night and by the hot smell of damp powderpuffs, tucked in the fronts of low dresses and distilling a thousandrich scents, to float out through the open door. The music itself, blurred by a loud trombone, became hot and shadowy, a languorousovertone to the scraping of many shoes and slippers. 

Suddenly the square of yellow light that fell through the door wasobscured by a dark figure. A girl had come out of the dressing-roomand was standing on the porch not more than ten feet away. Jim heard alow-breathed "doggone" and then she turned and saw him. It was NancyLamar. 

Jim rose to his feet. 

"Howdy?"

"Hello--" she paused, hesitated and then approached. "Oh, it's--JimPowell. "

He bowed slightly, tried to think of a casual remark. 

"Do you suppose, " she began quickly, "I mean--do you know anythingabout gum?"

"What?" "I've got gum on my shoe. Some utter ass left his or her gumon the floor and of course I stepped in it. "

Jim blushed, inappropriately. 

"Do you know how to get it off?" she demanded petulantly. "I've trieda knife. I've tried every damn thing in the dressing-room. I've triedsoap and water--and even perfume and I've ruined my powder-puff tryingto make it stick to that. "

Jim considered the question in some agitation. 

"Why--I think maybe gasolene--"

The words had scarcely left his lips when she grasped his hand andpulled him at a run off the low veranda, over a flower bed and at agallop toward a group of cars parked in the moonlight by the firsthole of the golf course. 

"Turn on the gasolene, " she commanded breathlessly. 

"What?"

"For the gum of course. I've got to get it off. I can't dance with gumon. "

Obediently Jim turned to the cars and began inspecting them with aview to obtaining the desired solvent. Had she demanded a cylinder hewould have done his best to wrench one out. 

"Here, " he said after a moment's search. "'Here's one that's easy. Gota handkerchief?"

"It's up-stairs wet. I used it for the soap and water. "

Jim laboriously explored his pockets. 

"Don't believe I got one either. "

"Doggone it! Well, we can turn it on and let it run on the ground. "

He turned the spout; a dripping began. 

"More!"

He turned it on fuller. The dripping became a flow and formed an oilypool that glistened brightly, reflecting a dozen tremulous moons onits quivering bosom. 

"Ah, " she sighed contentedly, "let it all out. The only thing to do isto wade in it. "

In desperation he turned on the tap full and the pool suddenly widenedsending tiny rivers and trickles in all directions. 

"That's fine. That's something like. "

Raising her skirts she stepped gracefully in. 

"I know this'll take it off, " she murmured. 

Jim smiled. 

"There's lots more cars. "

She stepped daintily out of the gasolene and began scraping herslippers, side and bottom, on the running-board of the automobile. Thejelly-bean contained himself no longer. He bent double with explosivelaughter and after a second she joined in. 

"You're here with Clark Darrow, aren't you?" she asked as they walkedback toward the veranda. 

"Yes. "

"You know where he is now?"

"Out dancin', I reckin. "

"The deuce. He promised me a highball. "

"Well, " said Jim, "I guess that'll be all right. I got his bottle righthere in my pocket. "

She smiled at him radiantly. 

"I guess maybe you'll need ginger ale though, " he added. 

"Not me. Just the bottle. "

"Sure enough?"

She laughed scornfully. 

"Try me. I can drink anything any man can. Let's sit down. "

She perched herself on the side of a table and he dropped into one ofthe wicker chairs beside her. Taking out the cork she held the flaskto her lips and took a long drink. He watched her fascinated. 

"Like it?"

She shook her head breathlessly. 

"No, but I like the way it makes me feel. I think most people are thatway. "

Jim agreed. 

"My daddy liked it too well. It got him. "

"American men, " said Nancy gravely, "don't know how to drink. "

"What?" Jim was startled. 

"In fact, " she went on carelessly, "they don't know how to do anythingvery well. The one thing I regret in my life is that I wasn't born inEngland. "

"In England?"

"Yes. It's the one regret of my life that I wasn't. "

"Do you like it over there?" "Yes. Immensely. I've never been there inperson, but I've met a lot of Englishmen who were over here in thearmy, Oxford and Cambridge men--you know, that's like Sewanee andUniversity of Georgia are here--and of course I've read a lot ofEnglish novels. "

Jim was interested, amazed. 

"D' you ever hear of Lady Diana Manner?" she asked earnestly. 

No, Jim had not. 

"Well, she's what I'd like to be. Dark, you know, like me, and wild assin. She's the girl who rode her horse up the steps of some cathedralor church or something and all the novelists made their heroines do itafterwards. "

Jim nodded politely. He was out of his depths. 

"Pass the bottle, " suggested Nancy. "I'm going to take another littleone. A little drink wouldn't hurt a baby. 

"You see, " she continued, again breathless after a draught. "Peopleover there have style, Nobody has style here. I mean the boys herearen't really worth dressing up for or doing sensational things for. Don't you know?"

"I suppose so--I mean I suppose not, " murmured Jim. 

"And I'd like to do 'em an' all. I'm really the only girl in town thathas style. "

She stretched, out her arms and yawned pleasantly. 

"Pretty evening. "

"Sure is, " agreed Jim. 

"Like to have boat" she suggested dreamily. "Like to sail out on asilver lake, say the Thames, for instance. Have champagne and caviaresandwiches along. Have about eight people. And one of the men wouldjump overboard to amuse the party, and get drowned like a man did withLady Diana Manners once. "

"Did he do it to please her?" "Didn't mean drown himself to pleaseher. He just meant to jump overboard and make everybody laugh, "

"I reckin they just died laughin' when he drowned. "

"Oh, I suppose they laughed a little, " she admitted. "I imagine shedid, anyway. She's pretty hard, I guess--like I am. "

"You hard?"

"Like nails. " She yawned again and added, "Give me a little more fromthat bottle. "

Jim hesitated but she held out her hand defiantly, "Don't treat melike a girl;" she warned him. "I'm not like any girl _you_ eversaw, " She considered. "Still, perhaps you're right. You got--you gotold head on young shoulders. "

She jumped to her feet and moved toward the door. The Jelly-bean rosealso. 

"Good-bye, " she said politely, "good-bye. Thanks, Jelly-bean. "

Then she stepped inside and left him wide-eyed upon the porch. 

III

At twelve o'clock a procession of cloaks issued single file from thewomen's dressing-room and, each one pairing with a coated beau likedancers meeting in a cotillion figure, drifted through the door withsleepy happy laughter--through the door into the dark where autosbacked and snorted and parties called to one another and gatheredaround the water-cooler. 

Jim, sitting in his corner, rose to look for Clark. They had met ateleven; then Clark had gone in to dance. So, seeking him, Jim wanderedinto the soft-drink stand that had once been a bar. The room wasdeserted except for a sleepy negro dozing behind the counter and twoboys lazily fingering a pair of dice at one of the tables. Jim wasabout to leave when he saw Clark coming in. At the same moment Clarklooked up. 

"Hi, Jim" he commanded. "C'mon over and help us with this bottle. Iguess there's not much left, but there's one all around. "

Nancy, the man from Savannah, Marylyn Wade, and Joe Ewing were lollingand laughing in the doorway. Nancy caught Jim's eye and winked at himhumorously. 

They drifted over to a table and arranging themselves around it waitedfor the waiter to bring ginger ale. Jim, faintly ill at ease, turnedhis eyes on Nancy, who had drifted into a nickel crap game with thetwo boys at the next table. 

"Bring them over here, " suggested Clark. 

Joe looked around. 

"We don't want to draw a crowd. It's against club rules. 

"Nobody's around, " insisted Clark, "except Mr. Taylor. He's walking upand down, like a wild-man trying find out who let all the gasolene outof his car. "

There was a general laugh. 

"I bet a million Nancy got something on her shoe again. You can't parkwhen she's around. "

"O Nancy, Mr. Taylor's looking for you!"

Nancy's cheeks were glowing with excitement over the game. "I haven'tseen his silly little flivver in two weeks. "

Jim felt a sudden silence. He turned and saw an individual ofuncertain age standing in the doorway. 

Clark's voice punctuated the embarrassment. 

"Won't you join us Mr. Taylor?"

"Thanks. "

Mr. Taylor spread his unwelcome presence over a chair. "Have to, Iguess. I'm waiting till they dig me up some gasolene. Somebody gotfunny with my car. "

His eyes narrowed and he looked quickly from one to the other. Jimwondered what he had heard from the doorway--tried to remember whathad been said. 

"I'm right to-night, " Nancy sang out, "and my four bits is in thering. "

"Faded!" snapped Taylor suddenly. 

"Why, Mr. Taylor, I didn't know you shot craps!" Nancy was overjoyedto find that he had seated himself and instantly covered her bet. Theyhad openly disliked each other since the night she had definitelydiscouraged a series of rather pointed advances. 

"All right, babies, do it for your mamma. Just one little seven. "Nancy was _cooing_ to the dice. She rattled them with a braveunderhand flourish, and rolled them out on the table. 

"Ah-h! I suspected it. And now again with the dollar up. "

Five passes to her credit found Taylor a bad loser. She was making itpersonal, and after each success Jim watched triumph flutter acrossher face. She was doubling with each throw--such luck could scarcelylast. "Better go easy, " he cautioned her timidly. 

"Ah, but watch this one, " she whispered. It was eight on the dice andshe called her number. 

"Little Ada, this time we're going South. "

Ada from Decatur rolled over the table. Nancy was flushed andhalf-hysterical, but her luck was holding. 

She drove the pot up and up, refusing to drag. Taylor was drummingwith his fingers on the table but he was in to stay. 

Then Nancy tried for a ten and lost the dice. Taylor seized themavidly. He shot in silence, and in the hush of excitement the clatterof one pass after another on the table was the only sound. 

Now Nancy had the dice again, but her luck had broken. An hour passed. Back and forth it went. Taylor had been at it again--and again andagain. They were even at last--Nancy lost her ultimate five dollars. 

"Will you take my check, " she said quickly, "for fifty, and we'llshoot it all?" Her voice was a little unsteady and her hand shook asshe reached to the money. 

Clark exchanged an uncertain but alarmed glance with Joe Ewing. Taylorshot again. He had Nancy's check. 

"How 'bout another?" she said wildly. "Jes' any bank'll do--moneyeverywhere as a matter of fact. "

Jim understood---the "good old corn" he had given her--the "good oldcorn" she had taken since. He wished he dared interfere--a girl ofthat age and position would hardly have two bank accounts. When theclock struck two he contained himself no longer. 

"May I--can't you let me roll 'em for you?" he suggested, his low, lazy voice a little strained. 

Suddenly sleepy and listless, Nancy flung the dice down before him. 

"All right--old boy! As Lady Diana Manners says, 'Shoot 'em, Jelly-bean'--My luck's gone. "

"Mr. Taylor, " said Jim, carelessly, "we'll shoot for one of thosethere checks against the cash. "

Half an hour later Nancy swayed forward and clapped him on the back. 

"Stole my luck, you did. " She was nodding her head sagely. 

Jim swept up the last check and putting it with the others tore theminto confetti and scattered them on the floor. Someone started singingand Nancy kicking her chair backward rose to her feet. 

"Ladies and gentlemen, " she announced, "Ladies--that's you Marylyn. Iwant to tell the world that Mr. Jim Powell, who is a well-knownJelly-bean of this city, is an exception to the great rule--'lucky indice--unlucky in love. ' He's lucky in dice, and as matter of fact I--I_love_ him. Ladies and gentlemen, Nancy Lamar, famous dark-hairedbeauty often featured in the _Herald_ as one the most popularmembers of younger set as other girls are often featured in thisparticular case; Wish to announce--wish to announce, anyway, Gentlemen--" She tipped suddenly. Clark caught her and restored herbalance. 

"My error, " she laughed, "she--stoops to--stoops to--anyways--We'lldrink to Jelly-bean . . . Mr. Jim Powell, King of the Jelly-beans. "

And a few minutes later as Jim waited hat in hand for Clark in thedarkness of that same corner of the porch where she had come searchingfor gasolene, she appeared suddenly beside him. 

"Jelly-bean, " she said, "are you here, Jelly-bean? I think--" and herslight unsteadiness seemed part of an enchanted dream--"I think youdeserve one of my sweetest kisses for that, Jelly-bean. "

For an instant her arms were around his neck--her lips were pressed tohis. 

"I'm a wild part of the world, Jelly-bean, but you did me a goodturn. "

Then she was gone, down the porch, over the cricket-loud lawn. Jim sawMerritt come out the front door and say something to her angrily--sawher laugh and, turning away, walk with averted eyes to his car. Marylyn and Joe followed, singing a drowsy song about a Jazz baby. 

Clark came out and joined Jim on the steps. "All pretty lit, I guess, "he yawned. "Merritt's in a mean mood. He's certainly off Nancy. "

Over east along the golf course a faint rug of gray spread itselfacross the feet of the night. The party in the car began to chant achorus as the engine warmed up. 

"Good-night everybody, " called Clark. 

"Good-night, Clark. "

"Good-night. "

There was a pause, and then a soft, happy voice added, "Good-night, Jelly-bean. "

The car drove off to a burst of singing. A rooster on a farm acrossthe way took up a solitary mournful crow, and behind them, a lastnegro waiter turned out the porch light, Jim and Clark strolled overtoward the Ford, their, shoes crunching raucously on the gravel drive. 

"Oh boy!" sighed Clark softly, "how you can set those dice!"

It was still too dark for him to see the flush on Jim's thincheeks--or to know that it was a flush of unfamiliar shame. 

IV

Over Tilly's garage a bleak room echoed all day to the rumble andsnorting down-stairs and the singing of the negro washers as theyturned the hose on the cars outside. It was a cheerless square of aroom, punctuated with a bed and a battered table on which lay half adozen books--Joe Miller's "Slow Train thru Arkansas, " "Lucille, " in anold edition very much annotated in an old-fashioned hand; "The Eyes ofthe World, " by Harold Bell Wright, and an ancient prayer-book of theChurch of England with the name Alice Powell and the date 1831 writtenon the fly-leaf. 

The East, gray when Jelly-bean entered the garage, became a rich andvivid blue as he turned on his solitary electric light. He snapped itout again, and going to the window rested his elbows on the sill andstared into the deepening morning. With the awakening of his emotions, his first perception was a sense of futility, a dull ache at the uttergrayness of his life. A wall had sprung up suddenly around him hedginghim in, a wall as definite and tangible as the white wall of his bareroom. And with his perception of this wall all that had been theromance of his existence, the casualness, the light-heartedimprovidence, the miraculous open-handedness of life faded out. TheJelly-bean strolling up Jackson Street humming a lazy song, known atevery shop and street stand, cropful of easy greeting and local wit, sad sometimes for only the sake of sadness and the flight oftime--that Jelly-bean was suddenly vanished. The very name was areproach, a triviality. With a flood of insight he knew that Merrittmust despise him, that even Nancy's kiss in the dawn would haveawakened not jealousy but only a contempt for Nancy's so loweringherself. And on his part the Jelly-bean had used for her a dingysubterfuge learned from the garage. He had been her moral laundry; thestains were his. 

As the gray became blue, brightened and filled the room, he crossed tohis bed and threw himself down on it, gripping the edges fiercely. 

"I love her, " he cried aloud, "God!"

As he said this something gave way within him like a lump melting inhis throat. The air cleared and became radiant with dawn, and turningover on his face he began to sob dully into the pillow. 

In the sunshine of three o'clock Clark Darrow chugging painfully alongJackson Street was hailed by the Jelly-bean, who stood on the curbwith his fingers in his vest pockets. 

"Hi!" called Clark, bringing his Ford to an astonishing stopalongside. "Just get up?"

The Jelly-bean shook his head. 

"Never did go to bed. Felt sorta restless, so I took a long walk thismorning out in the country. Just got into town this minute. "

"Should think you _would_ feel restless. I been feeling thatawayall day--"

"I'm thinkin' of leavin' town" continued the Jelly-bean, absorbed byhis own thoughts. "Been thinkin' of goin' up on the farm, and takin' alittle that work off Uncle Dun. Reckin I been bummin' too long. "

Clark was silent and the Jelly-bean continued:

"I reckin maybe after Aunt Mamie dies I could sink that money of minein the farm and make somethin' out of it. All my people originallycame from that part up there. Had a big place. "

Clark looked at him curiously. 

"That's funny, " he said. "This--this sort of affected me the sameway. "

The Jelly-bean hesitated. 

"I don't know, " he began slowly, "somethin' about--about that girllast night talkin' about a lady named Diana Manners--an English lady, sorta got me thinkin'!" He drew himself up and looked oddly at Clark, "I had a family once, " he said defiantly. 

Clark nodded. 

"I know. "

"And I'm the last of 'em, " continued the Jelly-bean his voice risingslightly, "and I ain't worth shucks. Name they call me by meansjelly--weak and wobbly like. People who weren't nothin' when my folkswas a lot turn up their noses when they pass me on the street. "

Again Clark was silent. 

"So I'm through, I'm goin' to-day. And when I come back to this townit's going to be like a gentleman. "

Clark took out his handkerchief and wiped his damp brow. 

"Reckon you're not the only one it shook up, " he admitted gloomily. "All this thing of girls going round like they do is going to stopright quick. Too bad, too, but everybody'll have to see it thataway. "

"Do you mean, " demanded Jim in surprise, "that all that's leaked out?"

"Leaked out? How on earth could they keep it secret. It'll beannounced in the papers to-night. Doctor Lamar's got to save his namesomehow. "

Jim put his hands on the sides of the car and tightened his longfingers on the metal. 

"Do you mean Taylor investigated those checks?"

It was Clark's turn to be surprised. 

"Haven't you heard what happened?"

Jim's startled eyes were answer enough. 

"Why, " announced Clark dramatically, "those four got another bottle ofcorn, got tight and decided to shock the town--so Nancy and that fellaMerritt were married in Rockville at seven o'clock this morning. "

A tiny indentation appeared in the metal under the Jelly-bean'sfingers. 

"Married?"

"Sure enough. Nancy sobered up and rushed back into town, crying andfrightened to death--claimed it'd all been a mistake. First DoctorLamar went wild and was going to kill Merritt, but finally they got itpatched up some way, and Nancy and Merritt went to Savannah on thetwo-thirty train. "

Jim closed his eyes and with an effort overcame a sudden sickness. 

"It's too bad, " said Clark philosophically. "I don't mean thewedding--reckon that's all right, though I don't guess Nancy cared adarn about him. But it's a crime for a nice girl like that to hurt herfamily that way. "

The Jelly-bean let go the car and turned away. Again something wasgoing on inside him, some inexplicable but almost chemical change. 

"Where you going?" asked Clark. 

The Jelly-bean turned and looked dully back over his shoulder. 

"Got to go, " he muttered. "Been up too long; feelin' right sick. "

"Oh. "

 * * * * *

The street was hot at three and hotter still at four, the April dustseeming to enmesh the sun and give it forth again as a world-old jokeforever played on an eternity of afternoons. But at half past four afirst layer of quiet fell and the shades lengthened under the awningsand heavy foliaged trees. In this heat nothing mattered. All life wasweather, a waiting through the hot where events had no significancefor the cool that was soft and caressing like a woman's hand on atired forehead. Down in Georgia there is a feeling--perhapsinarticulate--that this is the greatest wisdom of the South--so aftera while the Jelly-bean turned into a poolhall on Jackson Street wherehe was sure to find a congenial crowd who would make all the oldjokes--the ones he knew. 

THE CAMEL'S BACK

The glazed eye of the tired reader resting for a second on the abovetitle will presume it to be merely metaphorical. Stories about the cupand the lip and the bad penny and the new broom rarely have anything, to do with cups or lips or pennies or brooms. This story Is theexception. It has to do with a material, visible and large-as-lifecamel's back. 

Starting from the neck we shall work toward the tail. I want you tomeet Mr. Perry Parkhurst, twenty-eight, lawyer, native of Toledo. Perry has nice teeth, a Harvard diploma, parts his hair in the middle. You have met him before--in Cleveland, Portland, St. Paul, Indianapolis, Kansas City, and so forth. Baker Brothers, New York, pause on their semi-annual trip through the West to clothe him;Montmorency & Co. Dispatch a young man post-haste every three monthsto see that he has the correct number of little punctures on hisshoes. He has a domestic roadster now, will have a French roadster ifhe lives long enough, and doubtless a Chinese tank if it comes intofashion. He looks like the advertisement of the young man rubbing hissunset-colored chest with liniment and goes East every other year tohis class reunion. 

I want you to meet his Love. Her name is Betty Medill, and she wouldtake well in the movies. Her father gives her three hundred a month todress on, and she has tawny eyes and hair and feather fans of fivecolors. I shall also introduce her father, Cyrus Medill. Though he isto all appearances flesh and blood, he is, strange to say, commonlyknown in Toledo as the Aluminum Man. But when he sits in his clubwindow with two or three Iron Men, and the White Pine Man, and theBrass Man, they look very much as you and I do, only more so, if youknow what I mean. 

Now during the Christmas holidays of 1919 there took place in Toledo, counting only the people with the italicized _the_, forty-onedinner parties, sixteen dances, six luncheons, male and female, twelveteas, four stag dinners, two weddings, and thirteen bridge parties. Itwas the cumulative effect of all this that moved Perry Parkhurst onthe twenty-ninth day of December to a decision. 

This Medill girl would marry him and she wouldn't marry him. She washaving such a good time that she hated to take such a definite step. Meanwhile, their secret engagement had got so long that it seemed asif any day it might break off of its own weight. A little man namedWarburton, who knew it all, persuaded Perry to superman her, to get amarriage license and go up to the Medill house and tell her she'd haveto marry him at once or call it off forever. So he presented himself, his heart, his license, and his ultimatum, and within five minutesthey were in the midst of a violent quarrel, a burst of sporadic openfighting such as occurs near the end of all long wars and engagements. It brought about one of those ghastly lapses in which two people whoare in love pull up sharp, look at each other coolly and think it'sall been a mistake. Afterward they usually kiss wholesomely and assurethe other person it was all their fault. Say it all was my fault! Sayit was! I want to hear you say it!

But while reconciliation was trembling in the air, while each was, ina measure, stalling it off, so that they might the more voluptuouslyand sentimentally enjoy it when it came, they were permanentlyinterrupted by a twenty-minute phone call for Betty from a garrulousaunt. At the end of eighteen minutes Perry Parkhurst, urged on bypride and suspicion and injured dignity, put on his long fur coat, picked up his light brown soft hat, and stalked out the door, "It's all over, " he muttered brokenly as he tried to jam his car intofirst. "It's all over--if I have to choke you for an hour, damn you!". The last to the car, which had been standing some time and was quitecold. 

He drove downtown--that is, he got into a snow rut that led himdowntown. He sat slouched down very low in his seat, much toodispirited to care where he went. 

In front of the Clarendon Hotel he was hailed from the sidewalk by abad man named Baily, who had big teeth and lived at the hotel and hadnever been in love. 

"Perry, " said the bad man softly when the roadster drew up beside himat the, curb, "I've got six quarts of the doggonedest still champagneyou ever tasted. A third of it's yours, Perry, if you'll comeup-stairs and help Martin Macy and me drink it. "

"Baily, " said Perry tensely, "I'll drink your champagne. I'll drinkevery drop of it, I don't care if it kills me. "

"Shut up, you nut!" said the bad man gently. "They don't put woodalcohol in champagne. This is the stuff that proves the world is morethan six thousand years old. It's so ancient that the cork ispetrified. You have to pull it with a stone drill. "

"Take me up-stairs, " said Perry moodily. "If that cork sees my heartit'll fall out from pure mortification. "

The room up-stairs was full of those innocent hotel pictures of littlegirls eating apples and sitting in swings and talking to dogs. Theother decorations were neckties and a pink man reading a pink paperdevoted to ladies in pink tights. 

"When you have to go into the highways and byways----" said the pinkman, looking reproachfully at Baily and Perry. 

"Hello, Martin Macy, " said Perry shortly, "where's this stone-agechampagne?"

"What's the rush? This isn't an operation, understand. This is aparty. "

Perry sat down dully and looked disapprovingly at all the neckties. 

Baily leisurely opened the door of a wardrobe and brought out sixhandsome bottles. 

"Take off that darn fur coat!" said Martin Macy to Perry. "Or maybeyou'd like to have us open all the windows. "

"Give me champagne, " said Perry. 

"Going to the Townsends' circus ball to-night?"

"Am not!"

"'Vited?"

"Uh-huh. "

"Why not go?"

"Oh, I'm sick of parties, " exclaimed Perry. "I'm sick of 'em. I'vebeen to so many that I'm sick of 'em. "

"Maybe you're going to the Howard Tates' party?"

"No, I tell you; I'm sick of 'em. "

"Well, " said Macy consolingly, "the Tates' is just for college kidsanyways. "

"I tell you----"

"I thought you'd be going to one of 'em anyways. I see by the papersyou haven't missed a one this Christmas. "

"Hm, " grunted Perry morosely. 

He would never go to any more parties. Classical phrases played in hismind--that side of his life was closed, closed. Now when a man says"closed, closed" like that, you can be pretty sure that some woman hasdouble-closed him, so to speak. Perry was also thinking that otherclassical thought, about how cowardly suicide is. A noble thought thatone---warm and inspiring. Think of all the fine men we should lose ifsuicide were not so cowardly!

An hour later was six o'clock, and Perry had lost all resemblance tothe young man in the liniment advertisement. He looked like a roughdraft for a riotous cartoon. They were singing--an impromptu song ofBaily's improvisation:

 _"One Lump Perry, the parlor snake, Famous through the city for the way he drinks his tea; Plays with it, toys with it Makes no noise with it, Balanced on a napkin on his well-trained knee--"_

"Trouble is, " said Perry, who had just banged his hair with Baily'scomb and was tying an orange tie round it to get the effect of JuliusCaesar, "that you fellas can't sing worth a damn. Soon's I leave theair and start singing tenor you start singin' tenor too, "

"'M a natural tenor, " said Macy gravely. "Voice lacks cultivation, tha's all. Gotta natural voice, m'aunt used say. Naturally goodsinger. "

"Singers, singers, all good singers, " remarked Baily, who was at thetelephone. "No, not the cabaret; I want night egg. I mean somedog-gone clerk 'at's got food--food! I want----"

"Julius Caesar, " announced Perry, turning round from the mirror. "Manof iron will and stern 'termination"

"Shut up!" yelled Baily. "Say, iss Mr. Baily Sen' up enormous supper. Use y'own judgment. Right away. "

He connected the receiver and the hook with some difficulty, and thenwith his lips closed and an expression of solemn intensity in his eyeswent to the lower drawer of his dresser and pulled it open. 

"Lookit!" he commanded. In his hands he held a truncated garment ofpink gingham. 

"Pants, " he exclaimed gravely. "Lookit!"

This was a pink blouse, a red tie, and a Buster Brown collar. 

"Lookit!" he repeated. "Costume for the Townsends' circus ball. I'mli'l' boy carries water for the elephants. "

Perry was impressed in spite of himself. 

"I'm going to be Julius Caesar, " he announced after a moment ofconcentration. 

"Thought you weren't going!" said Macy. 

"Me? Sure I'm goin', Never miss a party. Good for the nerves--likecelery. "

"Caesar!" scoffed Baily. "Can't be Caesar! He is not about a circus. Caesar's Shakespeare. Go as a clown. "

Perry shook his head. 

"Nope; Caesar, "

"Caesar?"

"Sure. Chariot. "

Light dawned on Baily. 

"That's right. Good idea. "

Perry looked round the room searchingly. 

"You lend me a bathrobe and this tie, " he said finally. Bailyconsidered. 

"No good. "

"Sure, tha's all I need. Caesar was a savage. They can't kick if Icome as Caesar, if he was a savage. "

"No, " said Baily, shaking his head slowly. "Get a costume over at acostumer's. Over at Nolak's. "

"Closed up. "

"Find out. "

After a puzzling five minutes at the phone a small, weary voicemanaged to convince Perry that it was Mr. Nolak speaking, and thatthey would remain open until eight because of the Townsends' ball. Thus assured, Perry ate a great amount of filet mignon and drank histhird of the last bottle of champagne. At eight-fifteen the man in thetall hat who stands in front of the Clarendon found him trying tostart his roadster. 

"Froze up, " said Perry wisely. "The cold froze it. The cold air. "

"Froze, eh?"

"Yes. Cold air froze it. "

"Can't start it?"

"Nope. Let it stand here till summer. One those hot ole August days'llthaw it out awright. "

"Goin' let it stand?"

"Sure. Let 'er stand. Take a hot thief to steal it. Gemme taxi. "

The man in the tall hat summoned a taxi. 

"Where to, mister?"

"Go to Nolak's--costume fella. "

II

Mrs. Nolak was short and ineffectual looking, and on the cessation ofthe world war had belonged for a while to one of the newnationalities. Owing to unsettled European conditions she had neversince been quite sure what she was. The shop in which she and herhusband performed their daily stint was dim and ghostly, and peopledwith suits of armor and Chinese mandarins, and enormous papier-mâchébirds suspended from the ceiling. In a vague background many rows ofmasks glared eyelessly at the visitor, and there were glass cases fullof crowns and scepters, and jewels and enormous stomachers, andpaints, and crape hair, and wigs of all colors. 

When Perry ambled into the shop Mrs. Nolak was folding up the lasttroubles of a strenuous day, so she thought, in a drawer full of pinksilk stockings. 

"Something for you?" she queried pessimistically. "Want costume ofJulius Hur, the charioteer. "

Mrs. Nolak was sorry, but every stitch of charioteer had been rentedlong ago. Was it for the Townsends' circus ball?

It was. 

"Sorry, " she said, "but I don't think there's anything left that'sreally circus. "

This was an obstacle. 

"Hm, " said Perry. An idea struck him suddenly. "If you've got a, pieceof canvas I could go's a tent. "

"Sorry, but we haven't anything like that. A hardware store is whereyou'd have to go to. We have some very nice Confederate soldiers. "

"No. No soldiers. "

"And I have a very handsome king. "

He shook his head. 

"Several of the gentlemen" she continued hopefully, "are wearingstovepipe hats and swallow-tail coats and going as ringmasters--butwe're all out of tall hats. I can let you have some crape hair for amustache. "

"Want somep'n 'stinctive. "

"Something--let's see. Well, we have a lion's head, and a goose, and acamel--"

"Camel?" The idea seized Perry's imagination, gripped it fiercely. 

"Yes, but It needs two people. "

"Camel, That's the idea. Lemme see it. "

The camel was produced from his resting place on a top shelf. At firstglance he appeared to consist entirely of a very gaunt, cadaveroushead and a sizable hump, but on being spread out he was found topossess a dark brown, unwholesome-looking body made of thick, cottonycloth. 

"You see it takes two people, " explained Mrs. Nolak, holding the camelin frank admiration. "If you have a friend he could be part of it. Yousee there's sorta pants for two people. One pair is for the fella infront, and the other pair for the fella in back. The fella in frontdoes the lookin' out through these here eyes, an' the fella in backhe's just gotta stoop over an' folla the front fella round. "

"Put it on, " commanded Perry. 

Obediently Mrs. Nolak put her tabby-cat face inside the camel's headand turned it from side to side ferociously. 

Perry was fascinated. 

"What noise does a camel make?"

"What?" asked Mrs. Nolak as her face emerged, somewhat smudgy. "Oh, what noise? Why, he sorta brays. "

"Lemme see it in a mirror. "

Before a wide mirror Perry tried on the head and turned from side toside appraisingly. In the dim light the effect was distinctlypleasing. The camel's face was a study in pessimism, decorated withnumerous abrasions, and it must be admitted that his coat was in thatstate of general negligence peculiar to camels--in fact, he needed tobe cleaned and pressed--but distinctive he certainly was. He wasmajestic. He would have attracted attention in any gathering, if onlyby his melancholy cast of feature and the look of hunger lurking roundhis shadowy eyes. 

"You see you have to have two people, " said Mrs. Nolak again. 

Perry tentatively gathered up the body and legs and wrapped them abouthim, tying the hind legs as a girdle round his waist. The effect onthe whole was bad. It was even irreverent--like one of those mediaevalpictures of a monk changed into a beast by the ministrations of Satan. At the very best the ensemble resembled a humpbacked cow sitting onher haunches among blankets. 

"Don't look like anything at all, " objected Perry gloomily. 

"No, " said Mrs. Nolak; "you see you got to have two people. "

A solution flashed upon Perry. 

"You got a date to-night?"

"Oh, I couldn't possibly----"

"Oh, come on, " said Perry encouragingly. "Sure you can! Here! Be goodsport, and climb into these hind legs. "

With difficulty he located them, and extended their yawning depthsingratiatingly. But Mrs. Nolak seemed loath. She backed perverselyaway. 

"Oh, no----"

"C'mon! You can be the front if you want to. Or we'll flip a coin. "

"Make it worth your while. "

Mrs. Nolak set her lips firmly together. 

"Now you just stop!" she said with no coyness implied. "None of thegentlemen ever acted up this way before. My husband----"

"You got a husband?" demanded Perry. "Where is he?"

"He's home. "

"Wha's telephone number?"

After considerable parley he obtained the telephone number pertainingto the Nolak penates and got into communication with that small, wearyvoice he had heard once before that day. But Mr. Nolak, though takenoff his guard and somewhat confused by Perry's brilliant flow oflogic, stuck staunchly to his point. He refused firmly, but withdignity, to help out Mr. Parkhurst in the capacity of back part of acamel. 

Having rung off, or rather having been rung off on, Perry sat down ona three-legged stool to think it over. He named over to himself thosefriends on whom he might call, and then his mind paused as BettyMedill's name hazily and sorrowfully occurred to him. He had asentimental thought. He would ask her. Their love affair was over, butshe could not refuse this last request. Surely it was not much toask--to help him keep up his end of social obligation for one shortnight. And if she insisted, she could be the front part of the cameland he would go as the back. His magnanimity pleased him. His mindeven turned to rosy-colored dreams of a tender reconciliation insidethe camel--there hidden away from all the world. . . . 

"Now you'd better decide right off. "

The bourgeois voice of Mrs. Nolak broke in upon his mellow fancies androused him to action. He went to the phone and called up the Medillhouse. Miss Betty was out; had gone out to dinner. 

Then, when all seemed lost, the camel's back wandered curiously intothe store. He was a dilapidated individual with a cold in his head anda general trend about him of downwardness. His cap was pulled down lowon his head, and his chin was pulled down low on his chest, his coathung down to his shoes, he looked run-down, down at the heels, and--Salvation Army to the contrary--down and out. He said that he wasthe taxicab-driver that the gentleman had hired at the ClarendonHotel. He had been instructed to wait outside, but he had waited sometime, and a suspicion had grown upon him that the gentleman had goneout the back way with purpose to defraud him--gentlemen sometimesdid--so he had come in. He sank down onto the three-legged stool. 

"Wanta go to a party?" demanded Perry sternly. 

"I gotta work, " answered the taxi-driver lugubriously. "I gotta keepmy job. "

"It's a very good party. "

"'S a very good job. "

"Come on!" urged Perry. "Be a good fella. See--it's pretty!" He heldthe camel up and the taxi-driver looked at it cynically. 

"Huh!"

Perry searched feverishly among the folds of the cloth. 

"See!" he cried enthusiastically, holding up a selection of folds. "This is your part. You don't even have to talk. All you have to do isto walk--and sit down occasionally. You do all the sitting down. Thinkof it. I'm on my feet all the time and _you_ can sit down some ofthe time. The only time _I_ can sit down is when we're lyingdown, and you can sit down when--oh, any time. See?"

"What's 'at thing?" demanded the individual dubiously. "A shroud?"

"Not at all, " said Perry indignantly. "It's a camel. "

"Huh?"

Then Perry mentioned a sum of money, and the conversation left theland of grunts and assumed a practical tinge. Perry and thetaxi-driver tried on the camel in front of the mirror. 

"You can't see it, " explained Perry, peering anxiously out through theeyeholes, "but honestly, ole man, you look sim'ly great! Honestly!"

A grunt from the hump acknowledged this somewhat dubious compliment. 

"Honestly, you look great!" repeated Perry enthusiastically. "Moveround a little. "

The hind legs moved forward, giving the effect of a huge cat-camelhunching his back preparatory to a spring. 

"No; move sideways. "

The camel's hips went neatly out of joint; a hula dancer would havewrithed in envy. 

"Good, isn't it?" demanded Perry, turning to Mrs. Nolak for approval. 

"It looks lovely, " agreed Mrs. Nolak. 

"We'll take it, " said Perry. 

The bundle was stowed under Perry's arm and they left the shop. 

"Go to the party!" he commanded as he took his seat in the back. 

"What party?"

"Fanzy-dress party. "

"Where'bouts is it?"

This presented a new problem. Perry tried to remember, but the namesof all those who had given parties during the holidays dancedconfusedly before his eyes. He could ask Mrs. Nolak, but on lookingout the window he saw that the shop was dark. Mrs. Nolak had alreadyfaded out, a little black smudge far down the snowy street. 

"Drive uptown, " directed Perry with fine confidence. "If you see aparty, stop. Otherwise I'll tell you when we get there. "

He fell into a hazy daydream and his thoughts wandered again toBetty--he imagined vaguely that they had had a disagreement becauseshe refused to go to the party as the back part of the camel. He wasjust slipping off into a chilly doze when he was wakened by thetaxi-driver opening the door and shaking him by the arm. 

"Here we are, maybe. "

Perry looked out sleepily. A striped awning led from the curb up to aspreading gray stone house, from which issued the low drummy whine ofexpensive jazz. He recognized the Howard Tate house. 

"Sure, " he said emphatically; "'at's it! Tate's party to-night. Sure, everybody's goin'. "

"Say, " said the individual anxiously after another look at the awning, "you sure these people ain't gonna romp on me for comin' here?"

Perry drew himself up with dignity. 

"'F anybody says anything to you, just tell 'em you're part of mycostume. "

The visualization of himself as a thing rather than a person seemed toreassure the individual. 

"All right, " he said reluctantly. 

Perry stepped out under the shelter of the awning and began unrollingthe camel. 

"Let's go, " he commanded. 

Several minutes later a melancholy, hungry-looking camel, emittingclouds of smoke from his mouth and from the tip of his noble hump, might have been seen crossing the threshold of the Howard Tateresidence, passing a startled footman without so much as a snort, andheading directly for the main stairs that led up to the ballroom. Thebeast walked with a peculiar gait which varied between an uncertainlockstep and a stampede--but can best be described by the word"halting. " The camel had a halting gait--and as he walked healternately elongated and contracted like a gigantic concertina. 

III

The Howard Tates are, as every one who lives in Toledo knows, the mostformidable people in town. Mrs. Howard Tate was a Chicago Todd beforeshe became a Toledo Tate, and the family generally affect thatconscious simplicity which has begun to be the earmark of Americanaristocracy. The Tates have reached the stage where they talk aboutpigs and farms and look at you icy-eyed if you are not amused. Theyhave begun to prefer retainers rather than friends as dinner guests, spend a lot of money in a quiet way, and, having lost all sense ofcompetition, are in process of growing quite dull. 

The dance this evening was for little Millicent Tate, and though allages were represented, the dancers were mostly from school andcollege--the younger married crowd was at the Townsends' circus ballup at the Tallyho Club. Mrs. Tate was standing just inside tieballroom, following Millicent round with her eyes, and beamingwhenever she caught her bye. Beside her were two middle-agedsycophants, who were saying what a perfectly exquisite child Millicentwas. It was at this moment that Mrs. Tate was grasped firmly by theskirt and her youngest daughter, Emily, aged eleven, hurled herselfwith an "Oof!" into her mother's arms. 

"Why, Emily, what's the trouble?"

"Mamma, " said Emily, wild-eyed but voluble, "there's something out onthe stairs. "

"What?"

"There's a thing out on the stairs, mamma. I think it's a big dog, mamma, but it doesn't look like a dog. "

"What do you mean, Emily?"

The sycophants waved their heads sympathetically. 

"Mamma, it looks like a--like a camel. "

Mrs. Tate laughed. 

"You saw a mean old shadow, dear, that's all. "

"No, I didn't. No, it was some kind of thing, mamma--big. I was goingdown-stairs to see if there were any more people, and this dog orsomething, he was coming up-stairs. Kinda funny, mamma, like he waslame. And then he saw me and gave a sort of growl, and then he slippedat the top of the landing, and I ran. "

Mrs. Tate's laugh faded. 

"The child must have seen something, " she said. 

The sycophants agreed that the child must have seen something--andsuddenly all three women took an instinctive step away from the dooras the sounds of muffled steps were audible just outside. 

And then three startled gasps rang out as a dark brown form roundedthe corner, and they saw what was apparently a huge beast looking downat them hungrily. 

"Oof!" cried Mrs. Tate. 

"O-o-oh!" cried the ladies in a chorus. 

The camel suddenly humped his back, and the gasps turned to shrieks. 

"Oh--look!"

"What is it?"

The dancing stopped, bat the dancers hurrying over got quite adifferent impression of the invader; in fact, the young peopleimmediately suspected that it was a stunt, a hired entertainer come toamuse the party. The boys in long trousers looked at it ratherdisdainfully, and sauntered over with their hands in their pockets, feeling that their intelligence was being insulted. But the girlsuttered little shouts of glee. 

"It's a camel!"

"Well, if he isn't the funniest!"

The camel stood there uncertainly, swaying slightly from side to aide, and seeming to take in the room in a careful, appraising glance; thenas if he had come to an abrupt decision, he turned and ambled swiftlyout the door. 

Mr. Howard Tate had just come out of the library on the lower floor, and was standing chatting with a young man in the hall. Suddenly theyheard the noise of shouting up-stairs, and almost immediately asuccession of bumping sounds, followed by the precipitous appearanceat the foot of the stairway of a large brown beast that seemed to begoing somewhere in a great hurry. 

"Now what the devil!" said Mr. Tate, starting. 

The beast picked itself up not without dignity and, affecting an airof extreme nonchalance, as if he had just remembered an importantengagement, started at a mixed gait toward the front door. In fact, his front legs began casually to run. 

"See here now, " said Mr. Tate sternly. "Here! Grab it, Butterfield!Grab it!"

The young man enveloped the rear of the camel in a pair of compellingarms, and, realizing that further locomotion was impossible, the frontend submitted to capture and stood resignedly in a state of someagitation. By this time a flood of young people was pouringdown-stairs, and Mr. Tate, suspecting everything from an ingeniousburglar to an escaped lunatic, gave crisp directions to the young man:

"Hold him! Lead him in here; we'll soon see. "

The camel consented to be led into the library, and Mr. Tate, afterlocking the door, took a revolver from a table drawer and instructedthe young man to take the thing's head off. Then he gasped andreturned the revolver to its hiding-place. 

"Well, Perry Parkhurst!" he exclaimed in amazement. 

"Got the wrong party, Mr. Tate, " said Perry sheepishly. "Hope I didn'tscare you. "

"Well--you gave us a thrill, Perry. " Realization dawned on him. "You're bound for the Townsends' circus ball. "

"That's the general idea. "

"Let me introduce Mr. Butterfield, Mr. Parkhurst. " Then turning toPerry; "Butterfield is staying with us for a few days. "

"I got a little mixed up, " mumbled Perry. "I'm very sorry. "

"Perfectly all right; most natural mistake in the world. I've got aclown rig and I'm going down there myself after a while. " He turned toButterfield. "Better change your mind and come down with us. "

The young man demurred. He was going to bed. 

"Have a drink, Perry?" suggested Mr. Tate. 

"Thanks, I will. "

"And, say, " continued Tate quickly, "I'd forgotten all aboutyour--friend here. " He indicated the rear part of the camel. "I didn'tmean to seem discourteous. Is it any one I know? Bring him out. "

"It's not a friend, " explained Perry hurriedly. "I just rented him. "

"Does he drink?"

"Do you?" demanded Perry, twisting himself tortuously round. 

There was a faint sound of assent. 

"Sure he does!" said Mr. Tate heartily. "A really efficient camelought to be able to drink enough so it'd last him three days. "

"Tell you, " said Perry anxiously, "he isn't exactly dressed up enoughto come out. If you give me the bottle I can hand it back to him andhe can take his inside. "

From under the cloth was audible the enthusiastic smacking soundinspired by this suggestion. When a butler had appeared with bottles, glasses, and siphon one of the bottles was handed back; thereafter thesilent partner could be heard imbibing long potations at frequentintervals. 

Thus passed a benign hour. At ten o'clock Mr. Tate decided that they'dbetter be starting. He donned his clown's costume; Perry replaced thecamel's head, arid side by side they traversed on foot the singleblock between the Tate house and the Tallyho Club. 

The circus ball was in full swing. A great tent fly had been put upinside the ballroom and round the walls had been built rows of boothsrepresenting the various attractions of a circus side show, but thesewere now vacated and over the floor swarmed a shouting, laughingmedley of youth and color--downs, bearded ladies, acrobats, barebackriders, ringmasters, tattooed men, and charioteers. The Townsends haddetermined to assure their party of success, so a great quantity ofliquor had been surreptitiously brought over from their house and wasnow flowing freely. A green ribbon ran along the wall completely roundthe ballroom, with pointing arrows alongside and signs whichinstructed the uninitiated to "Follow the green line!" The green lineled down to the bar, where waited pure punch and wicked punch andplain dark-green bottles. 

On the wall above the bar was another arrow, red and very wavy, andunder it the slogan: "Now follow this!"

But even amid the luxury of costume and high spirits represented, there, the entrance of the camel created something of a stir, andPerry was immediately surrounded by a curious, laughing crowdattempting to penetrate the identity of this beast that stood by thewide doorway eying the dancers with his hungry, melancholy gaze. 

And then Perry saw Betty standing in front of a booth, talking to acomic policeman. She was dressed in the costume of an Egyptiansnake-charmer: her tawny hair was braided and drawn through brassrings, the effect crowned with a glittering Oriental tiara. Her fairface was stained to a warm olive glow and on her arms and the halfmoon of her back writhed painted serpents with single eyes of venomousgreen. Her feet were in sandals and her skirt was slit to the knees, so that when she walked one caught a glimpse of other slim serpentspainted just above her bare ankles. Wound about her neck was aglittering cobra. Altogether a charming costume--one that caused themore nervous among the older women to shrink away from her when shepassed, and the more troublesome ones to make great talk about"shouldn't be allowed" and "perfectly disgraceful. "

But Perry, peering through the uncertain eyes of the camel, saw onlyher face, radiant, animated, and glowing with excitement, and her armsand shoulders, whose mobile, expressive gestures made her always theoutstanding figure in any group. He was fascinated and his fascinationexercised a sobering effect on him. With a growing clarity the eventsof the day came back--rage rose within him, and with a half-formedintention of taking her away from the crowd he started toward her--orrather he elongated slightly, for he had neglected to issue thepreparatory command necessary to locomotion. 

But at this point fickle Kismet, who for a day had played with himbitterly and sardonically, decided to reward him in full for theamusement he had afforded her. Kismet turned the tawny eyes of thesnake-charmer to the camel. Kismet led her to lean toward the manbeside her and say, "Who's that? That camel?"

"Darned if I know. "

But a little man named Warburton, who knew it all, found it necessaryto hazard an opinion:

"It came in with Mr. Tate. I think part of it's probably WarrenButterfield, the architect from New York, who's visiting the Tates. "

Something stirred in Betty Medill--that age-old interest of theprovincial girl in the visiting man. 

"Oh, " she said casually after a slight pause. 

At the end of the next dance Betty and her partner finished up withina few feet of the camel. With the informal audacity that was thekey-note of the evening she reached out and gently rubbed the camel'snose. 

"Hello, old camel. "

The camel stirred uneasily. 

"You 'fraid of me?" said Betty, lifting her eyebrows in reproof. "Don't be. You see I'm a snake-charmer, but I'm pretty good at camelstoo. "

The camel bowed very low and some one made the obvious remark aboutbeauty and the beast. 

Mrs. Townsend approached the group. 

"Well, Mr. Butterfield, " she said helpfully, "I wouldn't haverecognised you. "

Perry bowed again and smiled gleefully behind his mask. 

"And who is this with you?" she inquired. 

"Oh, " said Perry, his voice muffled by the thick cloth and quiteunrecognizable, "he isn't a fellow, Mrs. Townsend. He's just part ofmy costume. "

Mrs. Townsend laughed and moved away. Perry turned again to Betty, "So, " he thought, "this is how much she cares! On the very day of ourfinal rupture she starts a flirtation with another man--an absolutestranger. "

On an impulse he gave her a soft nudge with his shoulder and waved hishead suggestively toward the hall, making it clear that he desired herto leave her partner and accompany him. 

"By-by, Rus, " she called to her partner. "This old camel's got me. Where we going, Prince of Beasts?"

The noble animal made no rejoinder, but stalked gravely along in thedirection of a secluded nook on the side stairs. 

There she seated herself, and the camel, after some seconds ofconfusion which included gruff orders and sounds of a heated disputegoing on in his interior, placed himself beside her--his hind legsstretching out uncomfortably across two steps. 

"Well, old egg, " said Betty cheerfully, "how do you like our happyparty?"

The old egg indicated that he liked it by rolling his headecstatically and executing a gleeful kick with his hoofs. 

"This is the first time that I ever had a tête-à-tête with a man'svalet 'round"--she pointed to the hind legs--"or whatever that is. "

"Oh, " mumbled Perry, "he's deaf and blind. "

"I should think you'd feel rather handicapped--you can't very welltoddle, even if you want to. "

The camel hang his head lugubriously. 

"I wish you'd say something, " continued Betty sweetly. "Say you likeme, camel. Say you think I'm beautiful. Say you'd like to belong to apretty snake-charmer. "

The camel would. 

"Will you dance with me, camel?"

The camel would try. 

Betty devoted half an hour to the camel. She devoted at least half anhour to all visiting men. It was usually sufficient. When sheapproached a new man the current débutantes were accustomed to scatterright and left like a close column deploying before a machine-gun. Andso to Perry Parkhurst was awarded the unique privilege of seeing hislove as others saw her. He was flirted with violently!

IV

This paradise of frail foundation was broken into by the sounds of ageneral ingress to the ballroom; the cotillion was beginning. Bettyand the camel joined the crowd, her brown hand resting lightly on hisshoulder, defiantly symbolizing her complete adoption of him. 

When they entered the couples were already seating themselves attables round the walls, and Mrs. Townsend, resplendent as a superbareback rider with rather too rotund calves, was standing in thecentre with the ringmaster in charge of arrangements. At a signal tothe band every one rose and began to dance. 

"Isn't it just slick!" sighed Betty. "Do you think you can possiblydance?"

Perry nodded enthusiastically. He felt suddenly exuberant. After all, he was here incognito talking to his love---he could winkpatronizingly at the world. 

So Perry danced the cotillion. I say danced, but that is stretchingthe word far beyond the wildest dreams of the jazziest terpsichorean. He suffered his partner to put her hands on his helpless shoulders andpull him here and there over the floor while he hung his huge headdocilely over her shoulder and made futile dummy motions with hisfeet. His hind legs danced in a manner all their own, chiefly byhopping first on one foot and then on the other. Never being surewhether dancing was going on or not, the hind legs played safe bygoing through a series of steps whenever the music started playing. Sothe spectacle was frequently presented of the front part of the camelstanding at ease and the rear keeping up a constant energetic motioncalculated to rouse a sympathetic perspiration in any soft-heartedobserver. 

He was frequently favored. He danced first with a tall lady coveredwith straw who announced jovially that she was a bale of hay and coylybegged him not to eat her. 

"I'd like to; you're so sweet, " said the camel gallantly. 

Each time the ringmaster shouted his call of "Men up!" he lumberedferociously for Betty with the cardboard wienerwurst or the photographof the bearded lady or whatever the favor chanced to be. Sometimes hereached her first, but usually his rushes were unsuccessful andresulted in intense interior arguments. 

"For Heaven's sake, " Perry would snarl, fiercely between his clenchedteeth, "get a little pep! I could have gotten her that time if you'dpicked your feet up. "

"Well, gimme a little warnin'!"

"I did, darn you. "

"I can't see a dog-gone thing in here. "

"All you have to do is follow me. It's just like dragging a load ofsand round to walk with you. "

"Maybe you wanta try back hare. "

"You shut up! If these people found you in this room they'd give youthe worst beating you ever had. They'd take your taxi license awayfrom you!"

Perry surprised himself by the ease with which he made this monstrousthreat, but it seemed to have a soporific influence on his companion, for he gave out an "aw gwan" and subsided into abashed silence. 

The ringmaster mounted to the top of the piano and waved his hand forsilence. 

"Prizes!" he cried. "Gather round!"

"Yea! Prizes!"

Self-consciously the circle swayed forward. The rather pretty girl whohad mustered the nerve to come as a bearded lady trembled withexcitement, thinking to be rewarded for an evening's hideousness. Theman who had spent the afternoon having tattoo marks painted on himskulked on the edge of the crowd, blushing furiously when any one toldhim he was sure to get it. 

"Lady and gent performers of this circus, " announced the ringmasterjovially, "I am sure we will all agree that a good time has been hadby all. We will now bestow honor where honor is due by bestowing theprizes. Mrs. Townsend has asked me to bestow the prices. Now, fellowperformers, the first prize is for that lady who has displayed thisevening the most striking, becoming"--at this point the bearded ladysighed resignedly--"and original costume. " Here the bale of haypricked up her ears. "Now I am sure that the decision which has beenagreed upon will be unanimous with all here present. The first prizegoes to Miss Betty Medill, the charming Egyptian snake-charmer. " Therewas a burst of applause, chiefly masculine, and Miss Betty Medill, blushing beautifully through her olive paint, was passed up to receiveher award. With a tender glance the ringmaster handed down to her ahuge bouquet of orchids. 

"And now, " he continued, looking round him, "the other prize is forthat man who has the most amusing and original costume. This prizegoes without dispute to a guest in our midst, a gentleman who isvisiting here but whose stay we all hope will be long and merry--inshort, to the noble camel who has entertained us all by his hungrylook and his brilliant dancing throughout the evening. "

He ceased and there was a violent clapping, and yeaing, for it was apopular choice. The prize, a large box of cigars, was put aside forthe camel, as he was anatomically unable to accept it in person. 

"And now, " continued the ringmaster, "we will wind up the cotillionwith the marriage of Mirth to Folly!

"Form for the grand wedding march, the beautiful snake-charmer and thenoble camel in front!"

Betty skipped forward cheerily and wound an olive arm round thecamel's neck. Behind them formed the procession of little boys, littlegirls, country jakes, fat ladies, thin men, sword-swallowers, wild menof Borneo, and armless wonders, many of them well in their cups, allof them excited and happy and dazzled by the flow of light and colorround them, and by the familiar faces, strangely unfamiliar underbizarre wigs and barbaric paint. The voluptuous chords of the weddingmarch done in blasphemous syncopation issued in a delirious blend fromthe trombones and saxophones--and the march began. 

"Aren't you glad, camel?" demanded Betty sweetly as they stepped off. "Aren't you glad we're going to be married and you're going to belongto the nice snake-charmer ever afterward?"

The camel's front legs pranced, expressing excessive joy. 

"Minister! Minister! Where's the minister?" cried voices out of therevel. "Who's going to be the clergyman?"

The head of Jumbo, obese negro, waiter at the Tally-ho Club for manyyears, appeared rashly through a half-opened pantry door. 

"Oh, Jumbo!"

"Get old Jumbo. He's the fella!"

"Come on, Jumbo. How 'bout marrying us a couple?"

"Yea!"

Jumbo was seized by four comedians, stripped of his apron, andescorted to a raised daïs at the head of the ball. There his collarwas removed and replaced back side forward with ecclesiastical effect. The parade separated into two lines, leaving an aisle for the brideand groom. 

"Lawdy, man, " roared Jumbo, "Ah got ole Bible 'n' ev'ythin', shonuff. "

He produced a battered Bible from an interior pocket. 

"Yea! Jumbo's got a Bible!"

"Razor, too, I'll bet!"

Together the snake-charmer and the camel ascended the cheering aisleand stopped in front of Jumbo. 

"Where's yo license, camel?"

A man near by prodded Perry. 

"Give him a piece of paper. Anything'll do. "

Perry fumbled confusedly in his pocket, found a folded paper, andpushed it out through the camel's mouth. Holding it upside down Jumbopretended to scan it earnestly. 

"Dis yeah's a special camel's license, " he said. "Get you ring ready, camel. "

Inside the camel Perry turned round and addressed his worse half. 

"Gimme a ring, for Heaven's sake!"

"I ain't got none, " protested a weary voice. 

"You have. I saw it. "

"I ain't goin' to take it offen my hand. "

"If you don't I'll kill you. "

There was a gasp and Perry felt a huge affair of rhinestone and brassinserted into his hand. 

Again he was nudged from the outside. 

"Speak up!"

"I do!" cried Perry quickly. 

He heard Betty's responses given in a debonair tone, and even in thisburlesque the sound thrilled him. 

Then he had pushed the rhinestone through a tear in the camel's coatand was slipping it on her finger, muttering ancient and historicwords after Jumbo. He didn't want any one to know about this ever. Hisone idea was to slip away without having to disclose his identity, forMr. Tate had so far kept his secret well. A dignified young man, Perry--and this might injure his infant law practice. 

"Embrace the bride!"

"Unmask, camel, and kiss her!"

Instinctively his heart beat high as Betty turned to him laughinglyand began to strike the card-board muzzle. He felt his self-controlgiving way, he longed to surround her with his arms and declare hisidentity and kiss those lips that smiled only a foot away--whensuddenly the laughter and applause round them died off and a curioushush fell over the hall. Perry and Betty looked up in surprise. Jumbohad given vent to a huge "Hello!" in such a startled voice that alleyes were bent on him. 

"Hello!" he said again. He had turned round the camel's marriagelicense, which he had been holding upside down, produced spectacles, and was studying it agonizingly. 

"Why, " he exclaimed, and in the pervading silence his words were heardplainly by every one in the room, "this yeah's a sho-nuff marriagepermit. "

"What?"

"Huh?"

"Say it again, Jumbo!"

"Sure you can read?"

Jumbo waved them to silence and Perry's blood burned to fire in hisveins as he realized the break he had made. 

"Yassuh!" repeated Jumbo. "This yeah's a sho-nuff license, and thepa'ties concerned one of 'em is dis yeah young lady, Miz Betty Medill, and th' other's Mistah Perry Pa'khurst. "

There was a general gasp, and a low rumble broke out as all eyes fellon the camel. Betty shrank away from him quickly, her tawny eyesgiving out sparks of fury. 

"Is you Mistah Pa'khurst, you camel?"

Perry made no answer. The crowd pressed up closer and stared at him. He stood frozen rigid with embarrassment, his cardboard face stillhungry and sardonic as he regarded the ominous Jumbo. 

"Y'all bettah speak up!" said Jumbo slowly, "this yeah's a mightyserious mattah. Outside mah duties at this club ah happens to be asho-nuff minister in the Firs' Cullud Baptis' Church. It done look tome as though y'all is gone an' got married. "

V

The scene that followed will go down forever in the annals of theTallyho Club. Stout matrons fainted, one hundred per cent Americansswore, wild-eyed débutantes babbled in lightning groups instantlyformed and instantly dissolved, and a great buzz of chatter, virulentyet oddly subdued, hummed through the chaotic ballroom. Feverishyouths swore they would kill Perry or Jumbo or themselves or some one, and the Baptis' preacheh was besieged by a tempestuous covey ofclamorous amateur lawyers, asking questions, making threats, demandingprecedents, ordering the bonds annulled, and especially trying toferret out any hint of prearrangement in what had occurred. 

In the corner Mrs. Townsend was crying softly on the shoulder of Mr. Howard Tate, who was trying vainly to comfort her; they wereexchanging "all my fault's" volubly and voluminously. Outside on asnow-covered walk Mr. Cyrus Medill, the Aluminum Man, was being pacedslowly up and down between two brawny charioteers, giving vent now toa string of unrepeatables, now to wild pleadings that they'd just lethim get at Jumbo. He was facetiously attired for the evening as a wildman of Borneo, and the most exacting stage-manager would haveacknowledged any improvement in casting the part to be quiteimpossible. 

Meanwhile the two principals held the real centre of the stage. BettyMedill--or was it Betty Parkhurst?--storming furiously, was surroundedby the plainer girls--the prettier ones were too busy talking abouther to pay much attention to her--and over on the other side of thehall stood the camel, still intact except for his headpiece, whichdangled pathetically on his chest. Perry was earnestly engaged inmaking protestations of his innocence to a ring of angry, puzzled men. Every few minutes, just as he had apparently proved his case, some onewould mention the marriage certificate, and the inquisition wouldbegin again. 

A girl named Marion Cloud, considered the second best belle of Toledo, changed the gist of the situation by a remark she made to Betty. 

"Well, " she said maliciously, "it'll all blow over, dear. The courtswill annul it without question. "

Betty's angry tears dried miraculously in her eyes, her lips shuttight together, and she looked stonily at Marion. Then she rose and, scattering her sympathizers right and left, walked directly across theroom to Perry, who stared at her in terror. Again silence crept downupon the room. 

"Will you have the decency to grant me five minutes' conversation--orwasn't that included in your plans?"

He nodded, his mouth unable to form words. 

Indicating coldly that he was to follow her she walked out into thehall with her chin uptilted and headed for the privacy of one of thelittle card-rooms. 

Perry started after her, but was brought to a jerky halt by thefailure of his hind legs to function. 

"You stay here!" he commanded savagely. 

"I can't, " whined a voice from the hump, "unless you get out first andlet me get out. "

Perry hesitated, but unable any longer to tolerate the eyes of thecurious crowd he muttered a command and the camel moved carefully fromthe room on its four legs. 

Betty was waiting for him. 

"Well, " she began furiously, "you see what you've done! You and thatcrazy license! I told you you shouldn't have gotten it!"

"My dear girl, I--"

"Don't say 'dear girl' to me! Save that for your real wife if you everget one after this disgraceful performance. And don't try to pretendit wasn't all arranged. You know you gave that colored waiter money!You know you did! Do you mean to say you didn't try to marry me?"

"No--of course--"

"Yes, you'd better admit it! You tried it, and now what are you goingto do? Do you know my father's nearly crazy? It'll serve you right ifhe tries to kill you. He'll take his gun and put some cold steel inyou. Even if this wed--this _thing_ can be annulled it'll hangover me all the rest of my life!"

Perry could not resist quoting softly: "'Oh, camel, wouldn't you liketo belong to the pretty snake-charmer for all your--"

"Shut-up!" cried Betty. 

There was a pause. 

"Betty, " said Perry finally, "there's only one thing to do that willreally get us out clear. That's for you to marry me. "

"Marry you!"

"Yes. Really it's the only--"

"You shut up! I wouldn't marry you if--if--"

"I know. If I were the last man on earth. But if you care anythingabout your reputation--"

"Reputation!" she cried. "You're a nice one to think about myreputation _now_. Why didn't you think about my reputation beforeyou hired that horrible Jumbo to--to--"

Perry tossed up his hands hopelessly. 

"Very well. I'll do anything you want. Lord knows I renounce allclaims!"

"But, " said a new voice, "I don't. "

Perry and Betty started, and she put her hand to her heart. 

"For Heaven's sake, what was that?"

"It's me, " said the camel's back. 

In a minute Perry had whipped off the camel's skin, and a lax, limpobject, his clothes hanging on him damply, his hand clenched tightlyon an almost empty bottle, stood defiantly before them. 

"Oh, " cried Betty, "you brought that object in here to frighten me!You told me he was deaf--that awful person!"

The camel's back sat down on a chair with a sigh of satisfaction. 

"Don't talk 'at way about me, lady. I ain't no person. I'm yourhusband. "

"Husband!"

The cry was wrung simultaneously from Betty and Perry. 

"Why, sure. I'm as much your husband as that gink is. The smoke didn'tmarry you to the camel's front. He married you to the whole camel. Why, that's my ring you got on your finger!"

With a little yelp she snatched the ring from her finger and flung itpassionately at the floor. 

"What's all this?" demanded Perry dazedly. 

"Jes' that you better fix me an' fix me right. If you don't I'ma-gonna have the same claim you got to bein' married to her!"

"That's bigamy, " said Perry, turning gravely to Betty. 

Then came the supreme moment of Perry's evening, the ultimate chanceon which he risked his fortunes. He rose and looked first at Betty, where she sat weakly, aghast at this new complication, and then at theindividual who swayed from side to side on his chair, uncertainly, menacingly. 

"Very well, " said Perry slowly to the individual, "you can have her. Betty, I'm going to prove to you that as far as I'm concerned ourmarriage was entirely accidental. I'm going to renounce utterly myrights to have you as my wife, and give you to--to the man whose ringyou wear--your lawful husband. "

There was a pause and four horror-stricken eyes were turned on him, "Good-by, Betty, " he said brokenly. "Don't forget me in your new-foundhappiness. I'm going to leave for the Far West on the morning train. Think of me kindly, Betty. "

With a last glance at them he turned and his head rested on his chestas his hand touched the door-knob. 

"Good-by, " he repeated. He turned the door-knob. 

But at this sound the snakes and silk and tawny hair precipitatedthemselves violently toward him. 

"Oh, Perry, don't leave me! Perry, Perry, take me with you!"

Her tears flowed damply on his neck. Calmly he folded his arms abouther. 

"I don't care, " she cried. "I love you and if you can wake up aminister at this hour and have it done over again I'll go West withyou. "

Over her shoulder the front part of the camel looked at the back partof the camel--and they exchanged a particularly subtle, esoteric sortof wink that only true camels can understand. 

MAY DAY

There had been a war fought and won and the great city of theconquering people was crossed with triumphal arches and vivid withthrown flowers of white, red, and rose. All through the long springdays the returning soldiers marched up the chief highway behind thestrump of drums and the joyous, resonant wind of the brasses, whilemerchants and clerks left their bickerings and figurings and, crowdingto the windows, turned their white-bunched faces gravely upon thepassing battalions. 

Never had there been such splendor in the great city, for thevictorious war had brought plenty in its train, and the merchants hadflocked thither from the South and West with their households to tasteof all the luscious feasts and witness the lavish entertainmentsprepared--and to buy for their women furs against the next winter andbags of golden mesh and varicolored slippers of silk and silver androse satin and cloth of gold. 

So gaily and noisily were the peace and prosperity impending hymned bythe scribes and poets of the conquering people that more and morespenders had gathered from the provinces to drink the wine ofexcitement, and faster and faster did the merchants dispose of theirtrinkets and slippers until they sent up a mighty cry for moretrinkets and more slippers in order that they might give in barterwhat was demanded of them. Some even of them flung up their handshelplessly, shouting:

"Alas! I have no more slippers! and alas! I have no more trinkets! Mayheaven help me for I know not what I shall do!"

But no one listened to their great outcry, for the throngs were fartoo busy--day by day, the foot-soldiers trod jauntily the highway andall exulted because the young men returning were pure and brave, soundof tooth and pink of cheek, and the young women of the land werevirgins and comely both of face and of figure. 

So during all this time there were many adventures that happened inthe great city, and, of these, several--or perhaps one--are here setdown. 

I

At nine o'clock on the morning of the first of May, 1919, a young manspoke to the room clerk at the Biltmore Hotel, asking if Mr. PhilipDean were registered there, and if so, could he be connected with Mr. Dean's rooms. The inquirer was dressed in a well-cut, shabby suit. Hewas small, slender, and darkly handsome; his eyes were framed abovewith unusually long eyelashes and below with the blue semicircle ofill health, this latter effect heightened by an unnatural glow whichcolored his face like a low, incessant fever. 

Mr. Dean was staying there. The young man was directed to a telephoneat the side. 

After a second his connection was made; a sleepy voice hello'd fromsomewhere above. 

"Mr. Dean?"--this very eagerly--"it's Gordon, Phil. It's GordonSterrett. I'm down-stairs. I heard you were in New York and I had ahunch you'd be here. "

The sleepy voice became gradually enthusiastic. Well, how was Gordy, old boy! Well, he certainly was surprised and tickled! Would Gordycome right up, for Pete's sake!

A few minutes later Philip Dean, dressed in blue silk pajamas, openedhis door and the two young men greeted each other with ahalf-embarrassed exuberance. They were both about twenty-four, Yalegraduates of the year before the war; but there the resemblancestopped abruptly. Dean was blond, ruddy, and rugged under his thinpajamas. Everything about him radiated fitness and bodily comfort. Hesmiled frequently, showing large and prominent teeth. 

"I was going to look you up, " he cried enthusiastically. "I'm taking acouple of weeks off. If you'll sit down a sec I'll be right with you. Going to take a shower. "

As he vanished into the bathroom his visitor's dark eyes rovednervously around the room, resting for a moment on a great Englishtravelling bag in the corner and on a family of thick silk shirtslittered on the chairs amid impressive neckties and soft woollensocks. 

Gordon rose and, picking up one of the shirts, gave it a minuteexamination. It was of very heavy silk, yellow, with a pale bluestripe--and there were nearly a dozen of them. He staredinvoluntarily at his own shirt-cuffs--they were ragged and linty atthe edges and soiled to a faint gray. Dropping the silk shirt, he heldhis coat-sleeves down and worked the frayed shirt-cuffs up till theywere out of sight. Then he went to the mirror and looked at himselfwith listless, unhappy interest. His tie, of former glory, was fadedand thumb-creased--it served no longer to hide the jagged buttonholesof his collar. He thought, quite without amusement, that only threeyears before he had received a scattering vote in the senior electionsat college for being the best-dressed man in his class. 

Dean emerged from the bathroom polishing his body. 

"Saw an old friend of yours last night, " he remarked. "Passed her in the lobby and couldn't think of her name to save myneck. That girl you brought up to New Haven senior year. "

Gordon started. 

"Edith Bradin? That whom you mean?"

"'At's the one. Damn good looking. She's still sort of a prettydoll--you know what I mean: as if you touched her she'd smear. "

He surveyed his shining self complacently in the mirror, smiledfaintly, exposing a section of teeth. 

"She must be twenty-three anyway, " he continued. 

"Twenty-two last month, " said Gordon absently. 

"What? Oh, last month. Well, I imagine she's down for the Gamma Psidance. Did you know we're having a Yale Gamma Psi dance to-night atDelmonico's? You better come up, Gordy. Half of New Haven'll probablybe there. I can get you an invitation. "

Draping himself reluctantly in fresh underwear, Dean lit a cigaretteand sat down by the open window, inspecting his calves and knees underthe morning sunshine which poured into the room. 

"Sit down, Gordy, " he suggested, "and tell me all about what you'vebeen doing and what you're doing now and everything. "

Gordon collapsed unexpectedly upon the bed; lay there inert andspiritless. His mouth, which habitually dropped a little open when hisface was in repose, became suddenly helpless and pathetic. 

"What's the matter?" asked Dean quickly. 

"Oh, God!"

"What's the matter?"

"Every God damn thing in the world, " he said miserably, "I'veabsolutely gone to pieces, Phil. I'm all in. "

"Huh?"

"I'm all in. " His voice was shaking. 

Dean scrutinized him more closely with appraising blue eyes. 

"You certainly look all shot. "

"I am. I've made a hell of a mess of everything. " He paused. "I'dbetter start at the beginning--or will it bore you?" "Not at all; goon. " There was, however, a hesitant note in Dean's voice. This tripEast had been planned for a holiday--to find Gordon Sterrett introuble exasperated him a little. 

"Go on, " he repeated, and then added half under his breath, "Get itover with. "

"Well, " began Gordon unsteadily, "I got back from France in February, went home to Harrisburg for a month, and then came down to New York toget a job. I got one--with an export company. They fired meyesterday. "

"Fired you?"

"I'm coming to that, Phil. I want to tell you frankly. You're aboutthe only man I can turn to in a matter like this. You won't mind if Ijust tell you frankly, will you, Phil?"

Dean stiffened a bit more. The pats he was bestowing on his knees grewperfunctory. He felt vaguely that he was being unfairly saddled withresponsibility; he was not even sure he wanted to be told. Thoughnever surprised at finding Gordon Sterrett in mild difficulty, therewas something in this present misery that repelled him and hardenedhim, even though it excited his curiosity. 

"Go on. "

"It's a girl. "

"Hm. " Dean resolved that nothing was going to spoil his trip. IfGordon was going to be depressing, then he'd have to see less ofGordon. 

"Her name is Jewel Hudson, " went on the distressed voice from the bed. "She used to be 'pure, ' I guess, up to about a year ago. " Lived herein New York--poor family. Her people are dead now and she lives withan old aunt. You see it was just about the time I met her thateverybody began to come back from France in droves--and all I did wasto welcome the newly arrived and go on parties with 'em. That's theway it started, Phil, just from being glad to see everybody and havingthem glad to see me. "

"You ought to've had more sense. "

"I know, " Gordon paused, and then continued listlessly. "I'm on my ownnow, you know, and Phil, I can't stand being poor. Then came this darngirl. She sort of fell in love with me for a while and, though I neverintended to get so involved, I'd always seem to run into hersomewhere. You can imagine the sort of work I was doing for thoseexporting people--of course, I always intended to draw; doillustrating for magazines; there's a pile of money in it. "

"Why didn't you? You've got to buckle down if you want to make good, "suggested Dean with cold formalism. 

"I tried, a little, but my stuff's crude. I've got talent, Phil; I candraw--but I just don't know how. I ought to go to art school and Ican't afford it. Well, things came to a crisis about a week ago. Justas I was down to about my last dollar this girl began bothering me. She wants some money; claims she can make trouble for me if shedoesn't get it. "

"Can she?"

"I'm afraid she can. That's one reason I lost my job--she kept callingup the office all the time, and that was sort of the last straw downthere. She's got a letter all written to send to my family. Oh, she'sgot me, all right. I've got to have some money for her. "

There was an awkward pause. Gordon lay very still, his hands clenchedby his side. 

"I'm all in, " he continued, his voice trembling. "I'm half crazy, Phil. If I hadn't known you were coming East, I think I'd have killedmyself. I want you to lend me three hundred dollars. "

Dean's hands, which had been patting his bare ankles, were suddenlyquiet--and the curious uncertainty playing between the two became tautand strained. 

After a second Gordon continued:

"I've bled the family until I'm ashamed to ask for another nickel. "

Still Dean made no answer. 

"Jewel says she's got to have two hundred dollars. "

"Tell her where she can go. "

"Yes, that sounds easy, but she's got a couple of drunken letters Iwrote her. Unfortunately she's not at all the flabby sort of personyou'd expect. "

Dean made an expression of distaste. 

"I can't stand that sort of woman. You ought to have kept away. "

"I know, " admitted Gordon wearily. 

"You've got to look at things as they are. If you haven't got moneyyou've got to work and stay away from women. "

"That's easy for you to say, " began Gordon, his eyes narrowing. "You've got all the money in the world. "

"I most certainly have not. My family keep darn close tab on what Ispend. Just because I have a little leeway I have to be extra carefulnot to abuse it. "

He raised the blind and let in a further flood of sunshine. 

"I'm no prig, Lord knows, " he went on deliberately. "I likepleasure--and I like a lot of it on a vacation like this, butyou're--you're in awful shape. I never heard you talk just this waybefore. You seem to be sort of bankrupt--morally as well asfinancially. "

"Don't they usually go together?"

Dean shook his head impatiently. 

"There's a regular aura about you that I don't understand. It's a sortof evil. "

"It's an air of worry and poverty and sleepless nights, " said Gordon, rather defiantly. 

"I don't know. "

"Oh, I admit I'm depressing. I depress myself. But, my God, Phil, aweek's rest and a new suit and some ready money and I'd be like--likeI was. Phil, I can draw like a streak, and you know it. But half thetime I haven't had the money to buy decent drawing materials--and Ican't draw when I'm tired and discouraged and all in. With a littleready money I can take a few weeks off and get started. "

"How do I know you wouldn't use it on some other woman?"

"Why rub it in?" said Gordon, quietly. 

"I'm not rubbing it in. I hate to see you this way. "

"Will you lend me the money, Phil?"

"I can't decide right off. That's a lot of money and it'll be darninconvenient for me. "

"It'll be hell for me if you can't--I know I'm whining, and it's allmy own fault but--that doesn't change it. "

"When could you pay it back?"

This was encouraging. Gordon considered. It was probably wisest to befrank. 

"Of course, I could promise to send it back next month, but--I'dbetter say three months. Just as soon as I start to sell drawings. "

"How do I know you'll sell any drawings?"

A new hardness in Dean's voice sent a faint chill of doubt overGordon. Was it possible that he wouldn't get the money?

"I supposed you had a little confidence in me. "

"I did have--but when I see you like this I begin to wonder. "

"Do you suppose if I wasn't at the end of my rope I'd come to you likethis? Do you think I'm enjoying it?" He broke off and bit his lip, feeling that he had better subdue the rising anger in his voice. Afterall, he was the suppliant. 

"You seem to manage it pretty easily, " said Dean angrily. "You put mein the position where, if I don't lend it to you, I'm a sucker--oh, yes, you do. And let me tell you it's no easy thing for me to get holdof three hundred dollars. My income isn't so big but that a slice likethat won't play the deuce with it. "

He left his chair and began to dress, choosing his clothes carefully. Gordon stretched out his arms and clenched the edges of the bed, fighting back a desire to cry out. His head was splitting andwhirring, his mouth was dry and bitter and he could feel the fever inhis blood resolving itself into innumerable regular counts like a slowdripping from a roof. 

Dean tied his tie precisely, brushed his eyebrows, and removed a pieceof tobacco from his teeth with solemnity. Next he filled his cigarettecase, tossed the empty box thoughtfully into the waste basket, andsettled the case in his vest pocket. 

"Had breakfast?" he demanded. 

"No; I don't eat it any more. "

"Well, we'll go out and have some. We'll decide about that moneylater. I'm sick of the subject. I came East to have a good time. 

"Let's go over to the Yale Club, " he continued moodily, and then addedwith an implied reproof: "You've given up your job. You've got nothingelse to do. "

"I'd have a lot to do if I had a little money, " said Gordon pointedly. 

"Oh, for Heaven's sake drop the subject for a while! No point inglooming on my whole trip. Here, here's some money. "

He took a five-dollar bill from his wallet and tossed it over toGordon, who folded it carefully and put it in his pocket. There was anadded spot of color in his cheeks, an added glow that was not fever. For an instant before they turned to go out their eyes met and in thatinstant each found something that made him lower his own glancequickly. For in that instant they quite suddenly and definitely hatedeach other. 

II

Fifth Avenue and Forty-fourth Street swarmed with the noon crowd. Thewealthy, happy sun glittered in transient gold through the thickwindows of the smart shops, lighting upon mesh bags and purses andstrings of pearls in gray velvet cases; upon gaudy feather fans ofmany colors; upon the laces and silks of expensive dresses; upon thebad paintings and the fine period furniture in the elaborate showrooms of interior decorators. 

Working-girls, in pairs and groups and swarms, loitered by thesewindows, choosing their future boudoirs from some resplendent displaywhich included even a man's silk pajamas laid domestically across thebed. They stood in front of the jewelry stores and picked out theirengagement rings, and their wedding rings and their platinum wristwatches, and then drifted on to inspect the feather fans and operacloaks; meanwhile digesting the sandwiches and sundaes they had eatenfor lunch. 

All through the crowd were men in uniform, sailors from the greatfleet anchored in the Hudson, soldiers with divisional insignia fromMassachusetts to California, wanting fearfully to be noticed, andfinding the great city thoroughly fed up with soldiers unless theywere nicely massed into pretty formations and uncomfortable under theweight of a pack and rifle. Through this medley Dean and Gordonwandered; the former interested, made alert by the display of humanityat its frothiest and gaudiest; the latter reminded of how often he hadbeen one of the crowd, tired, casually fed, overworked, anddissipated. To Dean the struggle was significant, young, cheerful; toGordon it was dismal, meaningless, endless. 

In the Yale Club they met a group of their former classmates whogreeted the visiting Dean vociferously. Sitting in a semicircle oflounges and great chairs, they had a highball all around. 

Gordon found the conversation tiresome and interminable. They lunchedtogether _en masse_, warmed with liquor as the afternoon began. They were all going to the Gamma Psi dance that night--it promised tobe the best party since the war. 

"Edith Bradin's coming, " said some one to Gordon. "Didn't she used tobe an old flame of yours? Aren't you both from Harrisburg?"

"Yes. " He tried to change the subject. "I see her brotheroccasionally. He's sort of a socialistic nut. Runs a paper orsomething here in New York. "

"Not like his gay sister, eh?" continued his eager informant. "Well, she's coming to-night--with a junior named Peter Himmel. "

Gordon was to meet Jewel Hudson at eight o'clock--he had promised tohave some money for her. Several times he glanced nervously at hiswrist watch. At four, to his relief, Dean rose and announced that hewas going over to Rivers Brothers to buy some collars and ties. But asthey left the Club another of the party joined them, to Gordon's greatdismay. Dean was in a jovial mood now, happy, expectant of theevening's party, faintly hilarious. Over in Rivers' he chose a dozenneckties, selecting each one after long consultations with the otherman. Did he think narrow ties were coming back? And wasn't it a shamethat Rivers couldn't get any more Welsh Margotson collars? There neverwas a collar like the "Covington. "

Gordon was in something of a panic. He wanted the money immediately. And he was now inspired also with a vague idea of attending the GammaPsi dance. He wanted to see Edith--Edith whom he hadn't met since oneromantic night at the Harrisburg Country Club just before he went toFrance. The affair had died, drowned in the turmoil of the war andquite forgotten in the arabesque of these three months, but a pictureof her, poignant, debonnaire, immersed in her own inconsequentialchatter, recurred to him unexpectedly and brought a hundred memorieswith it. It was Edith's face that he had cherished through collegewith a sort of detached yet affectionate admiration. He had loved todraw her--around his room had been a dozen sketches of her--playinggolf, swimming--he could draw her pert, arresting profile with hiseyes shut. 

They left Rivers' at five-thirty and parsed for a moment on thesidewalk. 

"Well, " said Dean genially, "I'm all set now. Think I'll go back tothe hotel and get a shave, haircut, and massage. "

"Good enough, " said the other man, "I think I'll join you. "

Gordon wondered if he was to be beaten after all. With difficulty herestrained himself from turning to the man and snarling out, "Go onaway, damn you!" In despair he suspected that perhaps Dean had spokento him, was keeping him along in order to avoid a dispute about themoney. 

They went into the Biltmore--a Biltmore alive with girls--mostly fromthe West and South, the stellar débutantes of many cities gathered forthe dance of a famous fraternity of a famous university. But to Gordonthey were faces in a dream. He gathered together his forces for a lastappeal, was about to come out with he knew not what, when Deansuddenly excused himself to the other man and taking Gordon's arm ledhim aside. 

"Gordy, " he said quickly, "I've thought the whole thing over carefullyand I've decided that I can't lend you that money. I'd like to obligeyou, but I don't feel I ought to--it'd put a crimp in me for a month. "

Gordon, watching him dully, wondered why he had never before noticedhow much those upper teeth projected. 

"I'm--mighty sorry, Gordon, " continued Dean, "but that's the way itis. "

He took out his wallet and deliberately counted out seventy-fivedollars in bills. 

"Here, " he said, holding them out, "here's seventy-five; that makeseighty all together. That's all the actual cash I have with me, besides what I'll actually spend on the trip. "

Gordon raised his clenched hand automatically, opened it as though itwere a tongs he was holding, and clenched it again on the money. 

"I'll see you at the dance, " continued Dean. "I've got to get along tothe barber shop. "

"So-long, " said Gordon in a strained and husky voice. 

"So-long. "

Dean, began to smile, but seemed to change his mind. He nodded brisklyand disappeared. 

But Gordon stood there, his handsome face awry with distress, the rollof bills clenched tightly in his hand. Then, blinded by sudden tears, he stumbled clumsily down the Biltmore steps. 

III

About nine o'clock of the same night two human beings came out of acheap restaurant in Sixth Avenue. They were ugly, ill-nourished, devoid of all except the very lowest form of intelligence, and withouteven that animal exuberance that in itself brings color into life;they were lately vermin-ridden, cold, and hungry in a dirty town of astrange land; they were poor, friendless; tossed as driftwood fromtheir births, they would be tossed as driftwood to their deaths. Theywere dressed in the uniform of the United States Army, and on theshoulder of each was the insignia of a drafted division from NewJersey, landed three days before. 

The taller of the two was named Carrol Key, a name hinting that in hisveins, however thinly diluted by generations of degeneration, ranblood of some potentiality. But one could stare endlessly at the long, chinless face, the dull, watery eyes, and high cheek-bones, withoutfinding suggestion of either ancestral worth or native resourcefulness. 

His companion was swart and bandy-legged, with rat-eyes and amuch-broken hooked nose. His defiant air was obviously a pretense, aweapon of protection borrowed from that world of snarl and snap, ofphysical bluff and physical menace, in which he had always lived. Hisname was Gus Rose. 

Leaving the café they sauntered down Sixth Avenue, wielding toothpickswith great gusto and complete detachment. 

"Where to?" asked Rose, in a tone which implied that he would not besurprised if Key suggested the South Sea Islands. 

"What you say we see if we can getta holda some liquor?" Prohibitionwas not yet. The ginger in the suggestion was caused by the lawforbidding the selling of liquor to soldiers. 

Rose agreed enthusiastically. 

"I got an idea, " continued Key, after a moment's thought, "I got abrother somewhere. "

"In New York?"

"Yeah. He's an old fella. " He meant that he was an elder brother. "He's a waiter in a hash joint. "

"Maybe he can get us some. "

"I'll say he can!"

"B'lieve me, I'm goin' to get this darn uniform off me to-morra. Neverget me in it again, neither. I'm goin' to get me some regularclothes. "

"Say, maybe I'm not. "

As their combined finances were something less than five dollars, thisintention can be taken largely as a pleasant game of words, harmlessand consoling. It seemed to please both of them, however, for theyreinforced it with chuckling and mention of personages high inbiblical circles, adding such further emphasis as "Oh, boy!" "Youknow!" and "I'll say so!" repeated many times over. 

The entire mental pabulum of these two men consisted of an offendednasal comment extended through the years upon the institution--army, business, or poorhouse--which kept them alive, and toward theirimmediate superior in that institution. Until that very morning theinstitution had been the "government" and the immediate superior hadbeen the "Cap'n"--from these two they had glided out and were now inthe vaguely uncomfortable state before they should adopt their nextbondage. They were uncertain, resentful, and somewhat ill at ease. This they hid by pretending an elaborate relief at being out of thearmy, and by assuring each other that military discipline should neveragain rule their stubborn, liberty-loving wills. Yet, as a matter offact, they would have felt more at home in a prison than in thisnew-found and unquestionable freedom. 

Suddenly Key increased his gait. Rose, looking up and following hisglance, discovered a crowd that was collecting fifty yards down thestreet. Key chuckled and began to run in the direction of the crowd;Rose thereupon also chuckled and his short bandy legs twinkled besidethe long, awkward strides of his companion. 

Reaching the outskirts of the crowd they immediately became anindistinguishable part of it. It was composed of ragged civilianssomewhat the worse for liquor, and of soldiers representing manydivisions and many stages of sobriety, all clustered around agesticulating little Jew with long black whiskers, who was waving hisarms and delivering an excited but succinct harangue. Key and Rose, having wedged themselves into the approximate parquet, scrutinized himwith acute suspicion, as his words penetrated their commonconsciousness. 

"--What have you got outa the war?" he was crying fiercely. "Lookarounja, look arounja! Are you rich? Have you got a lot of moneyoffered you?--no; you're lucky if you're alive and got both your legs;you're lucky if you came back an' find your wife ain't gone off withsome other fella that had the money to buy himself out of the war!That's when you're lucky! Who got anything out of it except J. P. Morgan an' John D. Rockerfeller?"

At this point the little Jew's oration was interrupted by the hostileimpact of a fist upon the point of his bearded chin and he toppledbackward to a sprawl on the pavement. 

"God damn Bolsheviki!" cried the big soldier-blacksmith, who haddelivered the blow. There was a rumble of approval, the crowd closedin nearer. 

The Jew staggered to his feet, and immediately went down again beforea half-dozen reaching-in fists. This time he stayed down, breathingheavily, blood oozing from his lip where it was cut within andwithout. 

There was a riot of voices, and in a minute Rose and Key foundthemselves flowing with the jumbled crowd down Sixth Avenue under theleadership of a thin civilian in a slouch hat and the brawny soldierwho had summarily ended the oration. The crowd had marvellouslyswollen to formidable proportions and a stream of more non-committalcitizens followed it along the sidewalks lending their moral supportby intermittent huzzas. 

"Where we goin'?" yelled Key to the man nearest him

His neighbor pointed up to the leader in the slouch hat. 

"That guy knows where there's a lot of 'em! We're goin' to show 'em!"

"We're goin' to show 'em!" whispered Key delightedly to Rose, whorepeated the phrase rapturously to a man on the other side. 

Down Sixth Avenue swept the procession, joined here and there bysoldiers and marines, and now and then by civilians, who came up withthe inevitable cry that they were just out of the army themselves, asif presenting it as a card of admission to a newly formed Sporting andAmusement Club. 

Then the procession swerved down a cross street and headed for FifthAvenue and the word filtered here and there that they were bound for aRed meeting at Tolliver Hall. 

"Where is it?"

The question went up the line and a moment later the answer floatedhack. Tolliver Hall was down on Tenth Street. There was a bunch ofother sojers who was goin' to break it up and was down there now!

But Tenth Street had a faraway sound and at the word a general groanwent up and a score of the procession dropped out. Among these wereRose and Key, who slowed down to a saunter and let the moreenthusiastic sweep on by. 

"I'd rather get some liquor, " said Key as they halted and made theirway to the sidewalk amid cries of "Shell hole!" and "Quitters!"

"Does your brother work around here?" asked Rose, assuming the air ofone passing from the superficial to the eternal. 

"He oughta, " replied Key. "I ain't seen him for a coupla years. I beenout to Pennsylvania since. Maybe he don't work at night anyhow. It'sright along here. He can get us some o'right if he ain't gone. "

They found the place after a few minutes' patrol of the street--ashoddy tablecloth restaurant between Fifth Avenue and Broadway. HereKey went inside to inquire for his brother George, while Rose waitedon the sidewalk. 

"He ain't here no more, " said Key emerging. "He's a waiter up toDelmonico's. "

Rose nodded wisely, as if he'd expected as much. One should not besurprised at a capable man changing jobs occasionally. He knew awaiter once--there ensued a long conversation as they waited as towhether waiters made more in actual wages than in tips--it was decidedthat it depended on the social tone of the joint wherein the waiterlabored. After having given each other vivid pictures of millionairesdining at Delmonico's and throwing away fifty-dollar bills after theirfirst quart of champagne, both men thought privately of becomingwaiters. In fact, Key's narrow brow was secreting a resolution to askhis brother to get him a job. 

"A waiter can drink up all the champagne those fellas leave inbottles, " suggested Rose with some relish, and then added as anafterthought, "Oh, boy!"

By the time they reached Delmonico's it was half past ten, and theywere surprised to see a stream of taxis driving up to the door oneafter the other and emitting marvelous, hatless young ladies, each oneattended by a stiff young gentleman in evening clothes. 

"It's a party, " said Rose with some awe. "Maybe we better not go in. He'll be busy. "

"No, he won't. He'll be o'right. "

After some hesitation they entered what appeared to them to be theleast elaborate door and, indecision falling upon them immediately, stationed themselves nervously in an inconspicuous corner of the smalldining-room in which they found themselves. They took off their capsand held them in their hands. A cloud of gloom fell upon them and bothstarted when a door at one end of the room crashed open, emitting acomet-like waiter who streaked across the floor and vanished throughanother door on the other side. 

There had been three of these lightning passages before the seekersmustered the acumen to hail a waiter. He turned, looked at themsuspiciously, and then approached with soft, catlike steps, as ifprepared at any moment to turn and flee. 

"Say, " began Key, "say, do you know my brother? He's a waiter here. "

"His name is Key, " annotated Rose. 

Yes, the waiter knew Key. He was up-stairs, he thought. There was abig dance going on in the main ballroom. He'd tell him. 

Ten minutes later George Key appeared and greeted his brother with theutmost suspicion; his first and most natural thought being that he wasgoing to be asked for money. 

George was tall and weak chinned, but there his resemblance to hisbrother ceased. The waiter's eyes were not dull, they were alert andtwinkling, and his manner was suave, in-door, and faintly superior. They exchanged formalities. George was married and had three children. He seemed fairly interested, but not impressed by the news that Carrolhad been abroad in the army. This disappointed Carrol. 

"George, " said the younger brother, these amenities having beendisposed of, "we want to get some booze, and they won't sell us none. Can you get us some?"

George considered. 

"Sure. Maybe I can. It may be half an hour, though. "

"All right, " agreed Carrol, "we'll wait"

At this Rose started to sit down in a convenient chair, but was hailedto his feet by the indignant George. 

"Hey! Watch out, you! Can't sit down here! This room's all set for atwelve o'clock banquet. "

"I ain't goin' to hurt it, " said Rose resentfully. "I been through thedelouser. "

"Never mind, " said George sternly, "if the head waiter seen me heretalkin' he'd romp all over me. "

"Oh. "

The mention of the head waiter was full explanation to the other two;they fingered their overseas caps nervously and waited for asuggestion. 

"I tell you, " said George, after a pause, "I got a place you can wait;you just come here with me. "

They followed him out the far door, through a deserted pantry and up apair of dark winding stairs, emerging finally into a small roomchiefly furnished by piles of pails and stacks of scrubbing brushes, and illuminated by a single dim electric light. There he left them, after soliciting two dollars and agreeing to return in half an hourwith a quart of whiskey. 

"George is makin' money, I bet, " said Key gloomily as he seatedhimself on an inverted pail. "I bet he's making fifty dollars a week. "

Rose nodded his head and spat. 

"I bet he is, too. "

"What'd he say the dance was of?"

"A lot of college fellas. Yale College. "

They, both nodded solemnly at each other. 

"Wonder where that crowda sojers is now?"

"I don't know. I know that's too damn long to walk for me. "

"Me too. You don't catch me walkin' that far. "

Ten minutes later restlessness seized them. 

"I'm goin' to see what's out here, " said Rose, stepping cautiouslytoward the other door. 

It was a swinging door of green baize and he pushed it open a cautiousinch. 

"See anything?"

For answer Rose drew in his breath sharply. 

"Doggone! Here's some liquor I'll say!"

"Liquor?"

Key joined Rose at the door, and looked eagerly. 

"I'll tell the world that's liquor, " he said, after a moment ofconcentrated gazing. 

It was a room about twice as large as the one they were in--and in itwas prepared a radiant feast of spirits. There were long walls ofalternating bottles set along two white covered tables; whiskey, gin, brandy, French and Italian vermouths, and orange juice, not to mentionan array of syphons and two great empty punch bowls. The room was asyet uninhabited. 

"It's for this dance they're just starting, " whispered Key; "hear theviolins playin'? Say, boy, I wouldn't mind havin' a dance. "

They closed the door softly and exchanged a glance of mutualcomprehension. There was no need of feeling each other out. 

"I'd like to get my hands on a coupla those bottles, " said Roseemphatically. 

"Me too. "

"Do you suppose we'd get seen?"

Key considered. 

"Maybe we better wait till they start drinkin' 'em. They got 'em alllaid out now, and they know how many of them there are. "

They debated this point for several minutes. Rose was all for gettinghis hands on a bottle now and tucking it under his coat before anyonecame into the room. Key, however, advocated caution. He was afraid hemight get his brother in trouble. If they waited till some of thebottles were opened it'd be all right to take one, and everybody'dthink it was one of the college fellas. 

While they were still engaged in argument George Key hurried throughthe room and, barely grunting at them, disappeared by way of the greenbaize door. A minute later they heard several corks pop, and then thesound of cracking ice and splashing liquid. George was mixing thepunch. 

The soldiers exchanged delighted grins. 

"Oh, boy!" whispered Rose. 

George reappeared. 

"Just keep low, boys, " he said quickly. "Ill have your stuff for youin five minutes. "

He disappeared through the door by which he had come. 

As soon as his footsteps receded down the stairs, Rose, after acautious look, darted into the room of delights and reappeared with abottle in his hand. 

"Here's what I say, " he said, as they sat radiantly digesting theirfirst drink. "We'll wait till he comes up, and we'll ask him if wecan't just stay here and drink what he brings us--see. We'll tell himwe haven't got any place to drink it--see. Then we can sneak in therewhenever there ain't nobody in that there room and tuck a bottle underour coats. We'll have enough to last us a coupla days--see?"

"Sure, " agreed Rose enthusiastically. "Oh, boy! And if we want to wecan sell it to sojers any time we want to. "

They were silent for a moment thinking rosily of this idea. Then Keyreached up and unhooked the collar of his O. D. Coat. 

"It's hot in here, ain't it?"

Rose agreed earnestly. 

"Hot as hell. "

IV

She was still quite angry when she came out of the dressing-room andcrossed the intervening parlor of politeness that opened onto thehall--angry not so much at the actual happening which was, after all, the merest commonplace of her social existence, but because it hadoccurred on this particular night. She had no quarrel with herself. She had acted with that correct mixture of dignity and reticent pitywhich she always employed. She had succinctly and deftly snubbed him. 

It had happened when their taxi was leaving the Biltmore--hadn't gonehalf a block. He had lifted his right arm awkwardly--she was on hisright side--and attempted to settle it snugly around the crimsonfur-trimmed opera cloak she wore. This in itself had been a mistake. It was inevitably more graceful for a young man attempting to embracea young lady of whose acquiescence he was not certain, to first puthis far arm around her. It avoided that awkward movement of raisingthe near arm. 

His second _faux pas_ was unconscious. She had spent theafternoon at the hairdresser's; the idea of any calamity overtakingher hair was extremely repugnant--yet as Peter made his unfortunateattempt the point of his elbow had just faintly brushed it. That washis second _faux pas_. Two were quite enough. 

He had begun to murmur. At the first murmur she had decided that hewas nothing but a college boy--Edith was twenty-two, and anyhow, thisdance, first of its kind since the war, was reminding her, with theaccelerating rhythm of its associations, of something else--of anotherdance and another man, a man for whom her feelings had been littlemore than a sad-eyed, adolescent mooniness. Edith Bradin was fallingin love with her recollection of Gordon Sterrett. 

So she came out of the dressing-room at Delmonico's and stood for asecond in the doorway looking over the shoulders of a black dress infront of her at the groups of Yale men who flitted like dignifiedblack moths around the head of the stairs. From the room she had leftdrifted out the heavy fragrance left by the passage to and fro of manyscented young beauties--rich perfumes and the fragile memory-ladendust of fragrant powders. This odor drifting out acquired the tang ofcigarette smoke in the hall, and then settled sensuously down thestairs and permeated the ballroom where the Gamma Psi dance was to beheld. It was an odor she knew well, exciting, stimulating, restlesslysweet--the odor of a fashionable dance. 

She thought of her own appearance. Her bare arms and shoulders werepowdered to a creamy white. She knew they looked very soft and wouldgleam like milk against the black backs that were to silhouette themto-night. The hairdressing had been a success; her reddish mass ofhair was piled and crushed and creased to an arrogant marvel of mobilecurves. Her lips were finely made of deep carmine; the irises of hereyes were delicate, breakable blue, like china eyes. She was acomplete, infinitely delicate, quite perfect thing of beauty, flowingin an even line from a complex coiffure to two small slim feet. 

She thought of what she would say to-night at this revel, faintlyprestiged already by the sounds of high and low laughter and slipperedfootsteps, and movements of couples up and down the stairs. She wouldtalk the language she had talked for many years--her line--made up ofthe current expressions, bits of journalese and college slang strungtogether into an intrinsic whole, careless, faintly provocative, delicately sentimental. She stalled faintly as she heard a girlsitting on the stairs near her say: "You don't know the half of it, dearie!"

And as she smiled her anger melted for a moment, and closing her eyesshe drew in a deep breath of pleasure. She dropped her arms to herside until they were faintly touching the sleek sheath that coveredand suggested her figure. She had never felt her own softness so muchnor so enjoyed the whiteness of her own arms. 

"I smell sweet, " she said to herself simply, and then came anotherthought "I'm made for love. "

She liked the sound of this and thought it again; then inevitablesuccession came her new-born riot of dreams about Gordon. The twist ofher imagination which, two months before, had disclosed to her herunguessed desire to see him again, seemed now to have been leading upto this dance, this hour. 

For all her sleek beauty, Edith was a grave, slow-thinking girl. Therewas a streak in her of that same desire to ponder, of that adolescentidealism that had turned her brother socialist and pacifist. HenryBradin had left Cornell, where he had been an instructor in economies, and had come to New York to pour the latest cures for incurable evilsinto the columns of a radical weekly newspaper. 

Edith, less fatuously, would have been content to cure GordonSterrett. There was a quality of weakness in Gordon that she wanted totake care of; there was a helplessness in him that she wanted toprotect. And she wanted someone she had known a long while, someonewho had loved her a long while. She was a little tired; she wanted toget married. Out of a pile of letters, half a dozen pictures and asmany memories, and this weariness, she had decided that next time shesaw Gordon their relations were going to be changed. She would saysomething that would change them. There was this evening. This was herevening. All evenings were her evenings. 

Then her thoughts were interrupted by a solemn undergraduate with ahurt look and an air of strained formality who presented himselfbefore her and bowed unusually low. It was the man she had come with, Peter Himmel. He was tall and humorous, with horned-rimmed glasses andan air of attractive whimsicality. She suddenly rather dislikedhim--probably because he had not succeeded in kissing her. 

"Well, " she began, "are you still furious at me?"

"Not at all. "

She stepped forward and took his arm. 

"I'm sorry, " she said softly. "I don't know why I snapped out thatway. I'm in a bum humor to-night for some strange reason. I'm sorry. "

"S'all right, " he mumbled, "don't mention it. "

He felt disagreeably embarrassed. Was she rubbing in the fact of hislate failure?

"It was a mistake, " she continued, on the same consciously gentle key. "We'll both forget it. " For this he hated her. 

A few minutes later they drifted out on the floor while the dozenswaying, sighing members of the specially hired jazz orchestrainformed the crowded ballroom that "if a saxophone and me are leftalone why then two is com-pan-ee!"

A man with a mustache cut in. 

"Hello, " he began reprovingly. "You don't remember me. "

"I can't just think of your name, " she said lightly--"and I know youso well. "

"I met you up at--" His voice trailed disconsolately off as a man withvery fair hair cut in. Edith murmured a conventional "Thanks, loads--cut in later, " to the _inconnu_. 

The very fair man insisted on shaking hands enthusiastically. Sheplaced him as one of the numerous Jims of her acquaintance--last namea mystery. She remembered even that he had a peculiar rhythm indancing and found as they started that she was right. 

"Going to be here long?" he breathed confidentially. 

She leaned back and looked up at him. 

"Couple of weeks. "

"Where are you?"

"Biltmore. Call me up some day. "

"I mean it, " he assured her. "I will. We'll go to tea. "

"So do I--Do. "

A dark man cut in with intense formality. 

"You don't remember me, do you?" he said gravely. 

"I should say I do. Your name's Harlan. "

"No-ope. Barlow. "

"Well, I knew there were two syllables anyway. You're the boy thatplayed the ukulele so well up at Howard Marshall's house party. 

"I played--but not--"

A man with prominent teeth cut in. Edith inhaled a slight cloud ofwhiskey. She liked men to have had something to drink; they were somuch more cheerful, and appreciative and complimentary--much easier totalk to. 

"My name's Dean, Philip Dean, " he said cheerfully. "You don't rememberme, I know, but you used to come up to New Haven with a fellow Iroomed with senior year, Gordon Sterrett. "

Edith looked up quickly. 

"Yes, I went up with him twice--to the Pump and Slipper and the Juniorprom. "

"You've seen him, of course, " said Dean carelessly. "He's hereto-night. I saw him just a minute ago. "

Edith started. Yet she had felt quite sure he would be here. 

"Why, no, I haven't--"

A fat man with red hair cut in. 

"Hello, Edith, " he began. 

"Why--hello there--"

She slipped, stumbled lightly. 

"I'm sorry, dear, " she murmured mechanically. 

She had seen Gordon--Gordon very white and listless, leaning againstthe side of a doorway, smoking, and looking into the ballroom. Edithcould see that his face was thin and wan--that the hand he raised tohis lips with a cigarette, was trembling. They were dancing quiteclose to him now. 

"--They invite so darn many extra fellas that you--" the short man wassaying. 

"Hello, Gordon, " called Edith over her partner's shoulder. Her heartwas pounding wildly. 

His large dark eyes were fixed on her. He took a step in herdirection. Her partner turned her away--she heard his voicebleating----

"--but half the stags get lit and leave before long, so--" Then a lowtone at her side. 

"May I, please?"

She was dancing suddenly with Gordon; one of his arms was around her;she felt it tighten spasmodically; felt his hand on her back with thefingers spread. Her hand holding the little lace handkerchief wascrushed in his. 

"Why Gordon, " she began breathlessly. 

"Hello, Edith. "

She slipped again--was tossed forward by her recovery until her facetouched the black cloth of his dinner coat. She loved him--she knewshe loved him--then for a minute there was silence while a strangefeeling of uneasiness crept over her. Something was wrong. 

Of a sudden her heart wrenched, and turned over as she realized whatit was. He was pitiful and wretched, a little drunk, and miserablytired. 

"Oh--" she cried involuntarily. 

His eyes looked down at her. She saw suddenly that they wereblood-streaked and rolling uncontrollably. 

"Gordon, " she murmured, "we'll sit down; I want to sit down. "

They were nearly in mid-floor, but she had seen two men start towardher from opposite sides of the room, so she halted, seized Gordon'slimp hand and led him bumping through the crowd, her mouth tight shut, her face a little pale under her rouge, her eyes trembling with tears. 

She found a place high up on the soft-carpeted stairs, and he sat downheavily beside her. 

"Well, " he began, staring at her unsteadily, "I certainly am glad tosee you, Edith. "

She looked at him without answering. The effect of this on her wasimmeasurable. For years she had seen men in various stages ofintoxication, from uncles all the way down to chauffeurs, and herfeelings had varied from amusement to disgust, but here for the firsttime she was seized with a new feeling--an unutterable horror. 

"Gordon, " she said accusingly and almost crying, "you look like thedevil. "

He nodded, "I've had trouble, Edith. "

"Trouble?"

"All sorts of trouble. Don't you say anything to the family, but I'mall gone to pieces. I'm a mess, Edith. "

His lower lip was sagging. He seemed scarcely to see her. 

"Can't you--can't you, " she hesitated, "can't you tell me about it, Gordon? You know I'm always interested in you. "

She bit her lip--she had intended to say something stronger, but foundat the end that she couldn't bring it out. 

Gordon shook his head dully. "I can't tell you. You're a good woman. Ican't tell a good woman the story. "

"Rot, " she said, defiantly. "I think it's a perfect insult to call anyone a good woman in that way. It's a slam. You've been drinking, Gordon. "

"Thanks. " He inclined his head gravely. "Thanks for the information. "

"Why do you drink?"

"Because I'm so damn miserable. "

"Do you think drinking's going to make it any better?"

"What you doing--trying to reform me?"

"No; I'm trying to help you, Gordon. Can't you tell me about it?"

"I'm in an awful mess. Best thing you can do is to pretend not to knowme. "

"Why, Gordon?"

"I'm sorry I cut in on you--its unfair to you. You're pure woman--andall that sort of thing. Here, I'll get some one else to dance withyou. "

He rose clumsily to his feet, but she reached up and pulled him downbeside her on the stairs. 

"Here, Gordon. You're ridiculous. You're hurting me. You're actinglike a--like a crazy man--"

"I admit it. I'm a little crazy. Something's wrong with me, Edith. There's something left me. It doesn't matter. "

"It does, tell me. "

"Just that. I was always queer--little bit different from other boys. All right in college, but now it's all wrong. Things have beensnapping inside me for four months like little hooks on a dress, andit's about to come off when a few more hooks go. I'm very graduallygoing loony. "

He turned his eyes full on her and began to laugh, and she shrank awayfrom him. 

"What _is_ the matter?"

"Just me, " he repeated. "I'm going loony. This whole place is like adream to me--this Delmonico's--"

As he talked she saw he had changed utterly. He wasn't at all lightand gay and careless--a great lethargy and discouragement had comeover him. Revulsion seized her, followed by a faint, surprisingboredom. His voice seemed to come out of a great void. 

"Edith, " he said, "I used to think I was clever, talented, an artist. Now I know I'm nothing. Can't draw, Edith. Don't know why I'm tellingyou this. "

She nodded absently. 

"I can't draw, I can't do anything. I'm poor as a church mouse. " Helaughed, bitterly and rather too loud. "I've become a damn beggar, aleech on my friends. I'm a failure. I'm poor as hell. "

Her distaste was growing. She barely nodded this time, waiting for herfirst possible cue to rise. 

Suddenly Gordon's eyes filled with tears. 

"Edith, " he said, turning to her with what was evidently a strongeffort at self-control, "I can't tell you what it means to me to knowthere's one person left who's interested in me. "

He reached out and patted her hand, and involuntarily she drew itaway. 

"It's mighty fine of you, " he repeated. 

"Well, " she said slowly, looking him in the eye, "any one's alwaysglad to see an old friend--but I'm sorry to see you like this, Gordon. "

There was a pause while they looked at each other, and the momentaryeagerness in his eyes wavered. She rose and stood looking at him, herface quite expressionless. 

"Shall we dance?" she suggested, coolly. 

--Love is fragile--she was thinking--but perhaps the pieces are saved, the things that hovered on lips, that might have been said. The newlove words, the tendernesses learned, are treasured up for the nextlover. 

V

Peter Himmel, escort to the lovely Edith, was unaccustomed to beingsnubbed; having been snubbed, he was hurt and embarrassed, and ashamedof himself. For a matter of two months he had been on special deliveryterms with Edith Bradin, and knowing that the one excuse andexplanation of the special delivery letter is its value in sentimentalcorrespondence, he had believed himself quite sure of his ground. Hesearched in vain for any reason why she should have taken thisattitude in the matter of a simple kiss. 

Therefore when he was cut in on by the man with the mustache he wentout into the hall and, making up a sentence, said it over to himselfseveral times. Considerably deleted, this was it:

"Well, if any girl ever led a man on and then jolted him, she did--andshe has no kick coming if I go out and get beautifully boiled. "

So he walked through the supper room into a small room adjoining it, which he had located earlier in the evening. It was a room in whichthere were several large bowls of punch flanked by many bottles. Hetook a seat beside the table which held the bottles. 

At the second highball, boredom, disgust, the monotony of time, theturbidity of events, sank into a vague background before whichglittering cobwebs formed. Things became reconciled to themselves, things lay quietly on their shelves; the troubles of the day arrangedthemselves in trim formation and at his curt wish of dismissal, marched off and disappeared. And with the departure of worry camebrilliant, permeating symbolism. Edith became a flighty, negligiblegirl, not to be worried over; rather to be laughed at. She fitted likea figure of his own dream into the surface world forming about him. Hehimself became in a measure symbolic, a type of the continentbacchanal, the brilliant dreamer at play. 

Then the symbolic mood faded and as he sipped his third highball hisimagination yielded to the warm glow and he lapsed into a statesimilar to floating on his back in pleasant water. It was at thispoint that he noticed that a green baize door near him was open abouttwo inches, and that through the aperture a pair of eyes were watchinghim intently. 

"Hm, " murmured Peter calmly. 

The green door closed--and then opened again--a bare half inch thistime. 

"Peek-a-boo, " murmured Peter. 

The door remained stationary and then he became aware of a series oftense intermittent whispers. 

"One guy. "

"What's he doin'?"

"He's sittin' lookin'. "

"He better beat it off. We gotta get another li'l' bottle. "

Peter listened while the words filtered into his consciousness. 

"Now this, " he thought, "is most remarkable. "

He was excited. He was jubilant. He felt that he had stumbled upon amystery. Affecting an elaborate carelessness he arose and waitedaround the table--then, turning quickly, pulled open the green door, precipitating Private Rose into the room. 

Peter bowed. 

"How do you do?" he said. 

Private Rose set one foot slightly in front of the other, poised forfight, flight, or compromise. 

"How do you do?" repeated Peter politely. 

"I'm o'right. "

"Can I offer you a drink?"

Private Rose looked at him searchingly, suspecting possible sarcasm. 

"O'right, " he said finally. 

Peter indicated a chair. 

"Sit down. "

"I got a friend, " said Rose, "I got a friend in there. " He pointed tothe green door. 

"By all means let's have him in. "

Peter crossed over, opened the door and welcomed in Private Key, verysuspicious and uncertain and guilty. Chairs were found and the threetook their seats around the punch bowl. Peter gave them each ahighball and offered them a cigarette from his case. They acceptedboth with some diffidence. 

"Now, " continued Peter easily, "may I ask why you gentlemen prefer tolounge away your leisure hours in a room which is chiefly furnished, as far as I can see, with scrubbing brushes. And when the human racehas progressed to the stage where seventeen thousand chairs aremanufactured on every day except Sunday--" he paused. Rose and Keyregarded him vacantly. "Will you tell me, " went on Peter, "why youchoose to rest yourselves on articles, intended for the transportationof water from one place to another?"

At this point Rose contributed a grunt to the conversation. 

"And lastly, " finished Peter, "will you tell me why, when you are in abuilding beautifully hung with enormous candelabra, you prefer tospend these evening hours under one anemic electric light?"

Rose looked at Key; Key looked at Rose. They laughed; they laugheduproariously; they found it was impossible to look at each otherwithout laughing. But they were not laughing with this man--they werelaughing at him. To them a man who talked after this fashion waseither raving drunk or raving crazy. 

"You are Yale men, I presume, " said Peter, finishing his highball andpreparing another. 

They laughed again. 

"Na-ah. "

"So? I thought perhaps you might be members of that lowly section ofthe university known as the Sheffield Scientific School. "

"Na-ah. "

"Hm. Well, that's too bad. No doubt you are Harvard men, anxious topreserve your incognito in this--this paradise of violet blue, as thenewspapers say. "

"Na-ah, " said Key scornfully, "we was just waitin' for somebody. "

"Ah, " exclaimed Peter, rising and filling their glasses, "veryinterestin'. Had a date with a scrublady, eh?"

They both denied this indignantly. 

"It's all right, " Peter reassured them, "don't apologize. Ascrublady's as good as any lady in the world. "

Kipling says 'Any lady and Judy O'Grady under the skin. '"

"Sure, " said Key, winking broadly at Rose. 

"My case, for instance, " continued Peter, finishing his glass. "I gota girl up here that's spoiled. Spoildest darn girl I ever saw. Refusedto kiss me; no reason whatsoever. Led me on deliberately to think sureI want to kiss you and then plunk! Threw me over! What's the youngergeneration comin' to?"

"Say tha's hard luck, " said Key--"that's awful hard luck. "

"Oh, boy!" said Rose. 

"Have another?" said Peter. 

"We got in a sort of fight for a while, " said Key after a pause, "butit was too far away. "

"A fight?--tha's stuff!" said Peter, seating himself unsteadily. "Fight 'em all! I was in the army. "

"This was with a Bolshevik fella. "

"Tha's stuff!" exclaimed Peter, enthusiastic. "That's, what I say!Kill the Bolshevik! Exterminate 'em!"

"We're Americuns, " said Rose, implying a sturdy, defiant patriotism. 

"Sure, " said Peter. "Greatest race in the world! We're all Americans!Have another. "

They had another. 

VI

At one o'clock a special orchestra, special even in a day of specialorchestras, arrived at Delmonico's, and its members, seatingthemselves arrogantly around the piano, took up the burden ofproviding music for the Gamma Psi Fraternity. They were headed by afamous flute-player, distinguished throughout New York for his feat ofstanding on his head and shimmying with his shoulders while he playedthe latest jazz on his flute. During his performance the lights wereextinguished except for the spotlight on the flute-player and anotherroving beam that threw flickering shadows and changing kaleidoscopiccolors over the massed dancers. 

Edith had danced herself into that tired, dreamy state habitual onlywith débutantes, a state equivalent to the glow of a noble soul afterseveral long highballs. Her mind floated vaguely on the bosom of hermusic; her partners changed with the unreality of phantoms under thecolorful shifting dusk, and to her present coma it seemed as if dayshad passed since the dance began. She had talked on many fragmentarysubjects with many men. She had been kissed once and made love to sixtimes. Earlier in the evening different under-graduates had dancedwith her, but now, like all the more popular girls there, she had herown entourage--that is, half a dozen gallants had singled her out orwere alternating her charms with those of some other chosen beauty;they cut in on her in regular, inevitable succession. 

Several times she had seen Gordon--he had been sitting a long time onthe stairway with his palm to his head, his dull eyes fixed at aninfinite spark on the floor before him, very depressed, he looked, andquite drunk--but Edith each time had averted her glance hurriedly. Allthat seemed long ago; her mind was passive now, her senses were lulledto trance-like sleep; only her feet danced and her voice talked on inhazy sentimental banter. 

But Edith was not nearly so tired as to be incapable of moralindignation when Peter Himmel cut in on her, sublimely and happilydrunk. She gasped and looked up at him. 

"Why, _Peter_!"

"I'm a li'l' stewed, Edith. "

"Why, Peter, you're a _peach_, you are! Don't you think it's abum way of doing--when you're with me?"

Then she smiled unwillingly, for he was looking at her with owlishsentimentality varied with a silly spasmodic smile. 

"Darlin' Edith, " he began earnestly, "you know I love you, don't you?"

"You tell it well. "

"I love you--and I merely wanted you to kiss me, " he added sadly. 

His embarrassment, his shame, were both gone. She was a mos' beautifulgirl in whole worl'. Mos' beautiful eyes, like stars above. He wantedto 'pologize--firs', for presuming try to kiss her; second, fordrinking--but he'd been so discouraged 'cause he had thought she wasmad at him----

The red-fat man cut in, and looking up at Edith smiled radiantly. 

"Did you bring any one?" she asked. 

No. The red-fat man was a stag. 

"Well, would you mind--would it be an awful bother for you to--to takeme home to-night?" (this extreme diffidence was a charming affectationon Edith's part--she knew that the red-fat man would immediatelydissolve into a paroxysm of delight). 

"Bother? Why, good Lord, I'd be darn glad to! You know I'd be darnglad to. "

"Thanks _loads_! You're awfully sweet. "

She glanced at her wrist-watch. It was half-past one. And, as she said"half-past one" to herself, it floated vaguely into her mind that herbrother had told her at luncheon that he worked in the office of hisnewspaper until after one-thirty every evening. 

Edith turned suddenly to her current partner. 

"What street is Delmonico's on, anyway?"

"Street? Oh, why Fifth Avenue, of course. "

"I mean, what cross street?"

"Why--let's see--it's on Forty-fourth Street. "

This verified what she had thought. Henry's office must be across thestreet and just around the corner, and it occurred to her immediatelythat she might slip over for a moment and surprise him, float in onhim, a shimmering marvel in her new crimson opera cloak and "cheer himup. " It was exactly the sort of thing Edith revelled in doing--anunconventional, jaunty thing. The idea reached out and gripped at herimagination--after an instant's hesitation she had decided. 

"My hair is just about to tumble entirely down, " she said pleasantlyto her partner; "would you mind if I go and fix it?"

"Not at all. "

"You're a peach. "

A few minutes later, wrapped in her crimson opera cloak, she flitteddown a side-stairs, her cheeks glowing with excitement at her littleadventure. She ran by a couple who stood at the door--a weak-chinnedwaiter and an over-rouged young lady, in hot dispute--and opening theouter door stepped into the warm May night. 

VII

The over-rouged young lady followed her with a brief, bitterglance--then turned again to the weak-chinned waiter and took up herargument. 

"You better go up and tell him I'm here, " she said defiantly, "or I'llgo up myself. "

"No, you don't!" said George sternly. 

The girl smiled sardonically. 

"Oh, I don't, don't I? Well, let me tell you I know more collegefellas and more of 'em know me, and are glad to take me out on aparty, than you ever saw in your whole life. "

"Maybe so--"

"Maybe so, " she interrupted. "Oh, it's all right for any of 'em likethat one that just ran out--God knows where _she_ went--it's allright for them that are asked here to come or go as they like--butwhen I want to see a friend they have some cheap, ham-slinging, bring-me-a-doughnut waiter to stand here and keep me out. "

"See here, " said the elder Key indignantly, "I can't lose my job. Maybe this fella you're talkin' about doesn't want to see you. "

"Oh, he wants to see me all right. "

"Anyways, how could I find him in all that crowd?"

"Oh, he'll be there, " she asserted confidently. "You just ask anybodyfor Gordon Sterrett and they'll point him out to you. They all knoweach other, those fellas. "

She produced a mesh bag, and taking out a dollar bill handed it toGeorge. 

"Here, " she said, "here's a bribe. You find him and give him mymessage. You tell him if he isn't here in five minutes I'm coming up. "

George shook his head pessimistically, considered the question for amoment, wavered violently, and then withdrew. 

In less than the allotted time Gordon came down-stairs. He was drunkerthan he had been earlier in the evening and in a different way. Theliquor seemed to have hardened on him like a crust. He was heavy andlurching--almost incoherent when he talked. 

"'Lo, Jewel, " he said thickly. "Came right away, Jewel, I couldn't getthat money. Tried my best. "

"Money nothing!" she snapped. "You haven't been near me for ten days. What's the matter?"

He shook his head slowly. 

"Been very low, Jewel. Been sick. "

"Why didn't you tell me if you were sick. I don't care about the moneythat bad. I didn't start bothering you about it at all until you beganneglecting me. "

Again he shook his head. 

"Haven't been neglecting you. Not at all. "

"Haven't! You haven't been near me for three weeks, unless you been sodrunk you didn't know what you were doing. "

"Been sick. Jewel, " he repeated, turning his eyes upon her wearily. 

"You're well enough to come and play with your society friends hereall right. You told me you'd meet me for dinner, and you said you'dhave some money for me. You didn't even bother to ring me up. "

"I couldn't get any money. "

"Haven't I just been saying that doesn't matter? I wanted to see_you_, Gordon, but you seem to prefer your somebody else. "

He denied this bitterly. 

"Then get your hat and come along, " she suggested. Gordonhesitated--and she came suddenly close to him and slipped her armsaround his neck. 

"Come on with me, Gordon, " she said in a half whisper. "We'll go overto Devineries' and have a drink, and then we can go up to myapartment. "

"I can't, Jewel, ----"

"You can, " she said intensely. 

"I'm sick as a dog!"

"Well, then, you oughtn't to stay here and dance. "

With a glance around him in which relief and despair were mingled, Gordon hesitated; then she suddenly pulled him to her and kissed himwith soft, pulpy lips. 

"All right, " he said heavily. "I'll get my hat. "

VII

When Edith came out into the clear blue of the May night she found theAvenue deserted. The windows of the big shops were dark; over theirdoors were drawn great iron masks until they were only shadowy tombsof the late day's splendor. Glancing down toward Forty-second Streetshe saw a commingled blur of lights from the all-night restaurants. Over on Sixth Avenue the elevated, a flare of fire, roared across thestreet between the glimmering parallels of light at the station andstreaked along into the crisp dark. But at Forty-fourth Street it wasvery quiet. 

Pulling her cloak close about her Edith darted across the Avenue. Shestarted nervously as a solitary man passed her and said in a hoarsewhisper--"Where bound, kiddo?" She was reminded of a night in herchildhood when she had walked around the block in her pajamas and adog had howled at her from a mystery-big back yard. 

In a minute she had reached her destination, a two-story, comparatively old building on Forty-fourth, in the upper window ofwhich she thankfully detected a wisp of light. It was bright enoughoutside for her to make out the sign beside the window--the _NewYork Trumpet_. She stepped inside a dark hall and after a secondsaw the stairs in the corner. 

Then she was in a long, low room furnished with many desks and hung onall sides with file copies of newspapers. There were only twooccupants. They were sitting at different ends of the room, eachwearing a green eye-shade and writing by a solitary desk light. 

For a moment she stood uncertainly in the doorway, and then both menturned around simultaneously and she recognized her brother. 

"Why, Edith!" He rose quickly and approached her in surprise, removinghis eye-shade. He was tall, lean, and dark, with black, piercing eyesunder very thick glasses. They were far-away eyes that seemed alwaysfixed just over the head of the person to whom he was talking. 

He put his hands on her arms and kissed her cheek. 

"What is it?" he repeated in some alarm. 

"I was at a dance across at Delmonico's, Henry, " she said excitedly, "and I couldn't resist tearing over to see you. "

"I'm glad you did. " His alertness gave way quickly to a habitualvagueness. "You oughtn't to be out alone at night though, ought you?"

The man at the other end of the room had been looking at themcuriously, but at Henry's beckoning gesture he approached. He wasloosely fat with little twinkling eyes, and, having removed his collarand tie, he gave the impression of a Middle-Western farmer on a Sundayafternoon. 

"This is my sister, " said Henry. "She dropped in to see me. "

"How do you do?" said the fat man, smiling. "My name's Bartholomew, Miss Bradin. I know your brother has forgotten it long ago. "

Edith laughed politely. 

"Well, " he continued, "not exactly gorgeous quarters we have here, arethey?"

Edith looked around the room. 

"They seem very nice, " she replied. "Where do you keep the bombs?"

"The bombs?" repeated Bartholomew, laughing. "That's pretty good--thebombs. Did you hear her, Henry? She wants to know where we keep thebombs. Say, that's pretty good. "

Edith swung herself onto a vacant desk and sat dangling her feet overthe edge. Her brother took a seat beside her. 

"Well, " he asked, absent-mindedly, "how do you like New York thistrip?"

"Not bad. I'll be over at the Biltmore with the Hoyts until Sunday. Can't you come to luncheon to-morrow?"

He thought a moment. 

"I'm especially busy, " he objected, "and I hate women in groups. "

"All right, " she agreed, unruffled. "Let's you and me have luncheontogether. "

"Very well. "

"I'll call for you at twelve. "

Bartholomew was obviously anxious to return to his desk, butapparently considered that it would be rude to leave without someparting pleasantry. 

"Well"--he began awkwardly. 

They both turned to him. 

"Well, we--we had an exciting time earlier in the evening. "

The two men exchanged glances. 

"You should have come earlier, " continued Bartholomew, somewhatencouraged. "We had a regular vaudeville. "

"Did you really?"

"A serenade, " said Henry. "A lot of soldiers gathered down there inthe street and began to yell at the sign. "

"Why?" she demanded. 

"Just a crowd, " said Henry, abstractedly. "All crowds have to howl. They didn't have anybody with much initiative in the lead, or they'dprobably have forced their way in here and smashed things up. "

"Yes, " said Bartholomew, turning again to Edith, "you should have beenhere. "

He seemed to consider this a sufficient cue for withdrawal, for heturned abruptly and went back to his desk. 

"Are the soldiers all set against the Socialists?" demanded Edith ofher brother. "I mean do they attack you violently and all that?"

Henry replaced his eye-shade and yawned. 

"The human race has come a long way, " he said casually, "but most ofus are throw-backs; the soldiers don't know what they want, or whatthey hate, or what they like. They're used to acting in large bodies, and they seem to have to make demonstrations. So it happens to beagainst us. There've been riots all over the city to-night. It's MayDay, you see. "

"Was the disturbance here pretty serious?"

"Not a bit, " he said scornfully. "About twenty-five of them stopped inthe street about nine o'clock, and began to bellow at the moon. "

"Oh"--She changed the subject. "You're glad to see me, Henry?"

"Why, sure. "

"You don't seem to be. "

"I am. "

"I suppose you think I'm a--a waster. Sort of the World's WorstButterfly. "

Henry laughed. 

"Not at all. Have a good time while you're young. Why? Do I seem likethe priggish and earnest youth?"

"No--" she paused, "--but somehow I began thinking how absolutelydifferent the party I'm on is from--from all your purposes. It seemssort of--of incongruous, doesn't it?--me being at a party like that, and you over here working for a thing that'll make that sort of partyimpossible ever any more, if your ideas work. "

"I don't think of it that way. You're young, and you're acting just asyou were brought up to act. Go ahead--have a good time?"

Her feet, which had been idly swinging, stopped and her voice droppeda note. 

"I wish you'd--you'd come back to Harrisburg and have a good time. Doyou feel sure that you're on the right track----"

"You're wearing beautiful stockings, " he interrupted. "What on earthare they?"

"They're embroidered, " she replied, glancing down; "Aren't theycunning?" She raised her skirts and uncovered slim, silk-sheathedcalves. "Or do you disapprove of silk stockings?"

He seemed slightly exasperated, bent his dark eyes on her piercingly. 

"Are you trying to make me out as criticizing you in any way, Edith?"

"Not at all-----"

She paused. Bartholomew had uttered a grunt. She turned and saw thathe had left his desk and was standing at the window. 

"What is it?" demanded Henry. 

"People, " said Bartholomew, and then after an instant: "Whole jam ofthem. They're coming from Sixth Avenue. "

"People?"

The fat man pressed his nose to the pane. 

"Soldiers, by God!" he said emphatically. "I had an idea they'd comeback. "

Edith jumped to her feet, and running over joined Bartholomew at thewindow. 

"There's a lot of them!" she cried excitedly. "Come here, Henry!"

Henry readjusted his shade, but kept his seat. 

"Hadn't we better turn out the lights?" suggested Bartholomew. 

"No. They'll go away in a minute. "

"They're not, " said Edith, peering from the window. "They're not eventhinking of going away. There's more of them coming. Look--there's awhole crowd turning the corner of Sixth Avenue, "

By the yellow glow and blue shadows of the street lamp she could seethat the sidewalk was crowded with men. They were mostly in uniform, some sober, some enthusiastically drunk, and over the whole swept anincoherent clamor and shouting. 

Henry rose, and going to the window exposed himself as a longsilhouette against the office lights. Immediately the shouting becamea steady yell, and a rattling fusillade of small missiles, corners oftobacco plugs, cigarette-boxes, and even pennies beat against thewindow. The sounds of the racket now began floating up the stairs asthe folding doors revolved. 

"They're coming up!" cried Bartholomew. 

Edith turned anxiously to Henry. 

"They're coming up, Henry. "

From down-stairs in the lower hall their cries were now quite audible. 

"--God Damn Socialists!"

"Pro-Germans! Boche-lovers!"

"Second floor, front! Come on!"

"We'll get the sons--"

The next five minutes passed in a dream. Edith was conscious that theclamor burst suddenly upon the three of them like a cloud of rain, that there was a thunder of many feet on the stairs, that Henry hadseized her arm and drawn her back toward the rear of the office. Thenthe door opened and an overflow of men were forced into the room--notthe leaders, but simply those who happened to be in front. 

"Hello, Bo!"

"Up late, ain't you!"

"You an' your girl. Damn _you_!"

She noticed that two very drunken soldiers had been forced to thefront, where they wobbled fatuously--one of them was short and dark, the other was tall and weak of chin. 

Henry stepped forward and raised his hand. 

"Friends!" he said. 

The clamor faded into a momentary stillness, punctuated withmutterings. 

"Friends!" he repeated, his far-away eyes fixed over the heads of thecrowd, "you're injuring no one but yourselves by breaking in hereto-night. Do we look like rich men? Do we look like Germans? I ask youin all fairness--"

"Pipe down!"

"I'll say you do!"

"Say, who's your lady friend, buddy?"

A man in civilian clothes, who had been pawing over a table, suddenlyheld up a newspaper. 

"Here it is!" he shouted, "They wanted the Germans to win the war!"

A new overflow from the stairs was shouldered in and of a sudden theroom was full of men all closing around the pale little group at theback. Edith saw that the tall soldier with the weak chin was still infront. The short dark one had disappeared. 

She edged slightly backward, stood close to the open window, throughwhich came a clear breath of cool night air. 

Then the room was a riot. She realized that the soldiers were surgingforward, glimpsed the fat man swinging a chair over hishead--instantly the lights went out and she felt the push of warmbodies under rough cloth, and her ears were full of shouting andtrampling and hard breathing. 

A figure flashed by her out of nowhere, tottered, was edged sideways, and of a sudden disappeared helplessly out through the open windowwith a frightened, fragmentary cry that died staccato on the bosom ofthe clamor. By the faint light streaming from the building backing onthe area Edith had a quick impression that it had been the tallsoldier with tie weak chin. 

Anger rose astonishingly in her. She swung her arms wildly, edgedblindly toward the thickest of the scuffling. She heard grunts, curses, the muffled impact of fists. 

"Henry!" she called frantically, "Henry!"

Then, it was minutes later, she felt suddenly that there were otherfigures in the room. She heard a voice, deep, bullying, authoritative;she saw yellow rays of light sweeping here and there in the fracas. The cries became more scattered. The scuffling increased and thenstopped. 

Suddenly the lights were on and the room was full of policemen, clubbing left and right. The deep voice boomed out:

"Here now! Here now! Here now!"

And then:

"Quiet down and get out! Here now!"

The room seemed to empty like a wash-bowl. A policeman fast-grappledin the corner released his hold on his soldier antagonist and startedhim with a shove toward the door. The deep voice continued. Edithperceived now that it came from a bull-necked police captain standingnear the door. 

"Here now! This is no way! One of your own sojers got shoved out ofthe back window an' killed hisself!"

"Henry!" called Edith, "Henry!"

She beat wildly with her fists on the back of the man in front of her;she brushed between two others; fought, shrieked, and beat her way toa very pale figure sitting on the floor close to a desk. 

"Henry, " she cried passionately, "what's the matter? What's thematter? Did they hurt you?"

His eyes were shut. He groaned and then looking up said disgustedly--

"They broke my leg. My God, the fools!"

"Here now!" called the police captain. "Here now! Here now!"

IX

"Childs', Fifty-ninth Street, " at eight o'clock of any morning differsfrom its sisters by less than the width of their marble tables or thedegree of polish on the frying-pans. You will see there a crowd ofpoor people with sleep in the corners of their eyes, trying to lookstraight before them at their food so as not to see the other poorpeople. But Childs', Fifty-ninth, four hours earlier is quite unlikeany Childs' restaurant from Portland, Oregon, to Portland, Maine. Within its pale but sanitary walls one finds a noisy medley of chorusgirls, college boys, debutantes, rakes, _filles de joie_--a notunrepresentative mixture of the gayest of Broadway, and even of FifthAvenue. 

In the early morning of May the second it was unusually full. Over themarble-topped tables were bent the excited faces of flappers whosefathers owned individual villages. They were eating buckwheat cakesand scrambled eggs with relish and gusto, an accomplishment that itwould have been utterly impossible for them to repeat in the sameplace four hours later. 

Almost the entire crowd were from the Gamma Psi dance at Delmonico'sexcept for several chorus girls from a midnight revue who sat at aside table and wished they'd taken off a little more make-up after theshow. Here and there a drab, mouse-like figure, desperately out ofplace, watched the butterflies with a weary, puzzled curiosity. Butthe drab figure was the exception. This was the morning after May Day, and celebration was still in the air. 

Gus Rose, sober but a little dazed, must be classed as one of the drabfigures. How he had got himself from Forty-fourth Street toFifty-ninth Street after the riot was only a hazy half-memory. He hadseen the body of Carrol Key put in an ambulance and driven off, andthen he had started up town with two or three soldiers. Somewherebetween Forty-fourth Street and Fifty-ninth Street the other soldiershad met some women and disappeared. Rose had wandered to ColumbusCircle and chosen the gleaming lights of Childs' to minister to hiscraving for coffee and doughnuts. He walked in and sat down. 

All around him floated airy, inconsequential chatter and high-pitchedlaughter. At first he failed to understand, but after a puzzled fiveminutes he realized that this was the aftermath of some gay party. Here and there a restless, hilarious young man wandered fraternallyand familiarly between the tables, shaking hands indiscriminately andpausing occasionally for a facetious chat, while excited waiters, bearing cakes and eggs aloft, swore at him silently, and bumped himout of the way. To Rose, seated at the most inconspicuous and leastcrowded table, the whole scene was a colorful circus of beauty andriotous pleasure. 

He became gradually aware, after a few moments, that the couple seateddiagonally across from him with their backs to the crowd, were not theleast interesting pair in the room. The man was drunk. He wore adinner coat with a dishevelled tie and shirt swollen by spillings ofwater and wine. His eyes, dim and blood-shot, roved unnaturally fromside to side. His breath came short between his lips. 

"He's been on a spree!" thought Rose. 

The woman was almost if not quite sober. She was pretty, with darkeyes and feverish high color, and she kept her active eyes fixed onher companion with the alertness of a hawk. From time to time shewould lean and whisper intently to him, and he would answer byinclining his head heavily or by a particularly ghoulish and repellentwink. 

Rose scrutinized them dumbly for some minutes until the woman gave hima quick, resentful look; then he shifted his gaze to two of the mostconspicuously hilarious of the promenaders who were on a protractedcircuit of the tables. To his surprise he recognized in one of themthe young man by whom he had been so ludicrously entertained atDelmonico's. This started him thinking of Key with a vaguesentimentality, not unmixed with awe. Key was dead. He had fallenthirty-five feet and split his skull like a cracked cocoa-nut. 

"He was a darn good guy, " thought Rose mournfully. "He was a darn goodguy, o'right. That was awful hard luck about him. "

The two promenaders approached and started down between Rose's tableand the next, addressing friends and strangers alike with jovialfamiliarity. Suddenly Rose saw the fair-haired one with the prominentteeth stop, look unsteadily at the man and girl opposite, and thenbegin to move his head disapprovingly from side to side. 

The man with the blood-shot eyes looked up. 

"Gordy, " said the promenader with the prominent teeth, "Gordy. "

"Hello, " said the man with the stained shirt thickly. 

Prominent teeth shook his finger pessimistically at the pair, givingthe woman a glance of aloof condemnation. 

"What'd I tell you Gordy?"

Gordon stirred in his seat. 

"Go to hell!" he said. 

Dean continued to stand there shaking his finger. The woman began toget angry, "You go way!" she cried fiercely. "You're drunk, that's what you are!"

"So's he, " suggested Dean, staying the motion of his finger andpointing it at Gordon. 

Peter Himmel ambled up, owlish now and oratorically inclined. 

"Here now, " he began as if called upon to deal with some petty disputebetween children. "Wha's all trouble?"

"You take your friend away, " said Jewel tartly. "He's bothering us. "

"What's at?"

"You heard me!" she said shrilly. "I said to take your drunken friendaway. "

Her rising voice rang out above the clatter of the restaurant and awaiter came hurrying up. 

"You gotta be more quiet!"

"That fella's drunk, " she cried. "He's insulting us. "

"Ah-ha, Gordy, " persisted the accused. "What'd I tell you. " He turnedto the waiter. "Gordy an' I friends. Been tryin' help him, haven't I, Gordy?"

Gordy looked up. 

"Help me? Hell, no!"

Jewel rose suddenly, and seizing Gordon's arm assisted him to hisfeet. 

"Come on, Gordy!" she said, leaning toward him and speaking in a halfwhisper. "Let's us get out of here. This fella's got a mean drunk on. "

Gordon allowed himself to be urged to his feet and started toward thedoor. Jewel turned for a second and addressed the provoker of theirflight. 

"I know all about _you_!" she said fiercely. "Nice friend, youare, I'll say. He told me about you. "

Then she seized Gordon's arm, and together they made their way throughthe curious crowd, paid their check, and went out. 

"You'll have to sit down, " said the waiter to Peter after they hadgone. 

"What's 'at? Sit down?"

"Yes--or get out. "

Peter turned to Dean. 

"Come on, " he suggested. "Let's beat up this waiter. "

"All right. "

They advanced toward him, their faces grown stern. The waiterretreated. 

Peter suddenly reached over to a plate on the table beside him andpicking up a handful of hash tossed it into the air. It descended as alanguid parabola in snowflake effect on the heads of those near by. 

"Hey! Ease up!"

"Put him out!"

"Sit down, Peter!"

"Cut out that stuff!"

Peter laughed and bowed. 

"Thank you for your kind applause, ladies and gents. If some one willlend me some more hash and a tall hat we will go on with the act. "

The bouncer bustled up. 

"You've gotta get out!" he said to Peter. 

"Hell, no!"

"He's my friend!" put in Dean indignantly. 

A crowd of waiters were gathering. "Put him out!"

"Better go, Peter. "

There was a short, struggle and the two were edged and pushed towardthe door. 

"I got a hat and a coat here!" cried Peter. 

"Well, go get 'em and be spry about it!"

The bouncer released his hold on Peter, who, adopting a ludicrous airof extreme cunning, rushed immediately around to the other table, where he burst into derisive laughter and thumbed his nose at theexasperated waiters. 

"Think I just better wait a l'il longer, " he announced. 

The chase began. Four waiters were sent around one way and fouranother. Dean caught hold of two of them by the coat, and anotherstruggle took place before the pursuit of Peter could be resumed; hewas finally pinioned after overturning a sugar-bowl and several cupsof coffee. A fresh argument ensued at the cashier's desk, where Peterattempted to buy another dish of hash to take with him and throw atpolicemen. 

But the commotion upon his exit proper was dwarfed by anotherphenomenon which drew admiring glances and a prolonged involuntary"Oh-h-h!" from every person in the restaurant. 

The great plate-glass front had turned to a deep blue, the color of aMaxfield Parrish moonlight--a blue that seemed to press close upon thepane as if to crowd its way into the restaurant. Dawn had come up inColumbus Circle, magical, breathless dawn, silhouetting the greatstatue of the immortal Christopher, and mingling in a curious anduncanny manner with the fading yellow electric light inside. 

X

Mr. In and Mr. Out are not listed by the census-taker. You will searchfor them in vain through the social register or the births, marriages, and deaths, or the grocer's credit list. Oblivion has swallowed themand the testimony that they ever existed at all is vague and shadowy, and inadmissible in a court of law. Yet I have it upon the bestauthority that for a brief space Mr. In and Mr. Out lived, breathed, answered to their names and radiated vivid personalities of their own. 

During the brief span of their lives they walked in their nativegarments down the great highway of a great nation; were laughed at, sworn at, chased, and fled from. Then they passed and were heard of nomore. 

They were already taking form dimly, when a taxi cab with the top openbreezed down Broadway in the faintest glimmer of May dawn. In this carsat the souls of Mr. In and Mr. Out discussing with amazement the bluelight that had so precipitately colored the sky behind the statue ofChristopher Columbus, discussing with bewilderment the old, gray facesof the early risers which skimmed palely along the street like blownbits of paper on a gray lake. They were agreed on all things, from theabsurdity of the bouncer in Childs' to the absurdity of the businessof life. They were dizzy with the extreme maudlin happiness that themorning had awakened in their glowing souls. Indeed, so fresh andvigorous was their pleasure in living that they felt it should beexpressed by loud cries. 

"Ye-ow-ow!" hooted Peter, making a megaphone with his hands--and Deanjoined in with a call that, though equally significant and symbolic, derived its resonance from its very inarticulateness. 

"Yo-ho! Yea! Yoho! Yo-buba!"

Fifty-third Street was a bus with a dark, bobbed-hair beauty atop;Fifty-second was a street cleaner who dodged, escaped, and sent up ayell of, "Look where you're aimin'!" in a pained and grieved voice. AtFiftieth Street a group of men on a very white sidewalk in front of avery white building turned to stare after them, and shouted:

"Some party, boys!"

At Forty-ninth Street Peter turned to Dean. "Beautiful morning, " hesaid gravely, squinting up his owlish eyes. 

"Probably is. "

"Go get some breakfast, hey?"

Dean agreed--with additions. 

"Breakfast and liquor. "

"Breakfast and liquor, " repeated Peter, and they looked at each other, nodding. "That's logical, "

Then they both burst into loud laughter. 

"Breakfast and liquor! Oh, gosh!"

"No such thing, " announced Peter. 

"Don't serve it? Ne'mind. We force 'em serve it Bring pressure bear. "

"Bring logic bear. "

The taxi cut suddenly off Broadway, sailed along a cross street, andstopped in front of a heavy tomb-like building in Fifth Avenue. 

"What's idea?"

The taxi-driver informed them that this was Delmonico's. 

This was somewhat puzzling. They were forced to devote several minutesto intense concentration, for if such an order had been given theremust have been a reason for it. 

"Somep'm 'bouta coat, " suggested the taxi-man. 

That was it. Peter's overcoat and hat. He had left them atDelmonico's. Having decided this, they disembarked from the taxi andstrolled toward the entrance arm in arm. 

"Hey!" said the taxi-driver. 

"Huh?"

"You better pay me. "

They shook their heads in shocked negation. 

"Later, not now--we give orders, you wait. "

The taxi-driver objected; he wanted his money now. With the scornfulcondescension of men exercising tremendous self-control they paid him. 

Inside Peter groped in vain through a dim, deserted check-room insearch of his coat and derby. 

"Gone, I guess. Somebody stole it. "

"Some Sheff student. "

"All probability. "

"Never mind, " said Dean, nobly. "I'll leave mine here too--then we'llboth be dressed the same. "

He removed his overcoat and hat and was hanging them up when hisroving glance was caught and held magnetically by two large squares ofcardboard tacked to the two coat-room doors. The one on the left-handdoor bore the word "In" in big black letters, and the one on theright-hand door flaunted the equally emphatic word "Out. "

"Look!" he exclaimed happily---

Peter's eyes followed his pointing finger. 

"What?"

"Look at the signs. Let's take 'em. "

"Good idea. "

"Probably pair very rare an' valuable signs. Probably come in handy. "

Peter removed the left-hand sign from the door and endeavored toconceal it about his person. The sign being of considerableproportions, this was a matter of some difficulty. An idea flungitself at him, and with an air of dignified mystery he turned hisback. After an instant he wheeled dramatically around, and stretchingout his arms displayed himself to the admiring Dean. He had insertedthe sign in his vest, completely covering his shirt front. In effect, the word "In" had been painted upon his shirt in large black letters. 

"Yoho!" cheered Dean. "Mister In. "

He inserted his own sign in like manner. 

"Mister Out!" he announced triumphantly. "Mr. In meet Mr. Out. "

They advanced and shook hands. Again laughter overcame them and theyrocked in a shaken spasm of mirth. 

"Yoho!"

"We probably get a flock of breakfast. "

"We'll go--go to the Commodore. "

Arm in arm they sallied out the door, and turning east in Forty-fourthStreet set out for the Commodore. 

As they came out a short dark soldier, very pale and tired, who hadbeen wandering listlessly along the sidewalk, turned to look at them. 

He started over as though to address them, but as they immediatelybent on him glances of withering unrecognition, he waited until theyhad started unsteadily down the street, and then followed at aboutforty paces, chuckling to himself and saying, "Oh, boy!" over and overunder his breath, in delighted, anticipatory tones. 

Mr. In and Mr. Out were meanwhile exchanging pleasantries concerningtheir future plans. 

"We want liquor; we want breakfast. Neither without the other. One andindivisible. "

"We want both 'em!"

"Both 'em!"

It was quite light now, and passers-by began to bend curious eyes onthe pair. Obviously they were engaged in a discussion, which affordedeach of them intense amusement, for occasionally a fit of laughterwould seize upon them so violently that, still with their armsinterlocked, they would bend nearly double. 

Reaching the Commodore, they exchanged a few spicy epigrams with thesleepy-eyed doorman, navigated the revolving door with somedifficulty, and then made their way through a thinly populated butstartled lobby to the dining-room, where a puzzled waiter showed theman obscure table in a corner. They studied the bill of farehelplessly, telling over the items to each other in puzzled mumbles. 

"Don't see any liquor here, " said Peter reproachfully. 

The waiter became audible but unintelligible. 

"Repeat, " continued Peter, with patient tolerance, "that there seemsto be unexplained and quite distasteful lack of liquor upon bill offare. "

"Here!" said Dean confidently, "let me handle him. " He turned to thewaiter--"Bring us--bring us--" he scanned the bill of fare anxiously. "Bring us a quart of champagne and a--a--probably ham sandwich. "

The waiter looked doubtful. 

"Bring it!" roared Mr. In and Mr. Out in chorus. 

The waiter coughed and disappeared. There was a short wait duringwhich they were subjected without their knowledge to a carefulscrutiny by the head-waiter. Then the champagne arrived, and at thesight of it Mr. In and Mr. Out became jubilant. 

"Imagine their objecting to us having, champagne for breakfast--jus'imagine. "

They both concentrated upon the vision of such an awesome possibility, but the feat was too much for them. It was impossible for their jointimaginations to conjure up a world where any one might object any oneelse having champagne for breakfast. The waiter drew the cork with anenormous _pop_ and their glasses immediately foamed with paleyellow froth. 

"Here's health, Mr. In. "

"Here's same to you, Mr. Out. "

The waiter withdrew; the minutes passed; the champagne became low inthe bottle. 

"It's--it's mortifying, " said Dean suddenly. 

"Wha's mortifying?"

"The idea their objecting us having champagne breakfast. "

"Mortifying?" Peter considered. "Yes, tha's word--mortifying. "

Again they collapsed into laughter, howled, swayed, rocked back andforth in their chairs, repeating the word "mortifying" over and overto each other--each repetition seeming to make it only morebrilliantly absurd. 

After a few more gorgeous minutes they decided on another quart. Theiranxious waiter consulted his immediate superior, and this discreetperson gave implicit instructions that no more champagne should beserved. Their check was brought. 

Five minutes later, arm in arm, they left the Commodore and made theirway through a curious, staring crowd along Forty-second Street, and upVanderbilt Avenue to the Biltmore. There, with sudden cunning, theyrose to the occasion and traversed the lobby, walking fast andstanding unnaturally erect. 

Once in the dining-room they repeated their performance. They weretorn between intermittent convulsive laughter and sudden spasmodicdiscussions of politics, college, and the sunny state of theirdispositions. Their watches told them that it was now nine o'clock, and a dim idea was born in them that they were on a memorable party, something that they would remember always. They lingered over thesecond bottle. Either of them had only to mention the word"mortifying" to send them both into riotous gasps. The dining-room waswhirring and shifting now; a curious lightness permeated and rarefiedthe heavy air. 

They paid their check and walked out into the lobby. 

It was at this moment that the exterior doors revolved for thethousandth time that morning, and admitted into the lobby a very paleyoung beauty with dark circles under her eyes, attired in amuch-rumpled evening dress. She was accompanied by a plain stout man, obviously not an appropriate escort. 

At the top of the stairs this couple encountered Mr. In and Mr. Out. 

"Edith, " began Mr. In, stepping toward her hilariously and making asweeping bow, "darling, good morning. "

The stout man glanced questioningly at Edith, as if merely asking herpermission to throw this man summarily out of the way. 

"'Scuse familiarity, " added Peter, as an afterthought. "Edith, good-morning. "

He seized Dean's elbow and impelled him into the foreground. 

"Meet Mr. In, Edith, my bes' frien'. Inseparable. Mr. In and Mr. Out. "

Mr. Out advanced and bowed; in fact, he advanced so far and bowed solow that he tipped slightly forward and only kept his balance byplacing a hand lightly on Edith's shoulder. 

"I'm Mr. Out, Edith, " he mumbled pleasantly. "S'misterin Misterout. "

"'Smisterinanout, " said Peter proudly. 

But Edith stared straight by them, her eyes fixed on some infinitespeck in the gallery above her. She nodded slightly to the stout man, who advanced bull-like and with a sturdy brisk gesture pushed Mr. Inand Mr. Out to either side. Through this alley he and Edith walked. 

But ten paces farther on Edith stopped again--stopped and pointed to ashort, dark soldier who was eying the crowd in general, and thetableau of Mr. In and Mr. Out in particular, with a sort of puzzled, spell-bound awe. 

"There, " cried Edith. "See there!"

Her voice rose, became somewhat shrill. Her pointing finger shookslightly. 

"There's the soldier who broke my brother's leg. "

There were a dozen exclamations; a man in a cutaway coat left hisplace near the desk and advanced alertly; the stout person made a sortof lightning-like spring toward the short, dark soldier, and then thelobby closed around the little group and blotted them from the sightof Mr. In and Mr. Out. 

But to Mr. In and Mr. Out this event was merely a particolorediridescent segment of a whirring, spinning world. 

They heard loud voices; they saw the stout man spring; the picturesuddenly blurred. 

Then they were in an elevator bound skyward. 

"What floor, please?" said the elevator man. 

"Any floor, " said Mr. In. 

"Top floor, " said Mr. Out. 

"This is the top floor, " said the elevator man. 

"Have another floor put on, " said Mr. Out. 

"Higher, " said Mr. In. 

"Heaven, " said Mr. Out. 

XI

In a bedroom of a small hotel just off Sixth Avenue Gordon Sterrettawoke with a pain in the back of his head and a sick throbbing in allhis veins. He looked at the dusky gray shadows in the corners of theroom and at a raw place on a large leather chair in the corner whereit had long been in use. He saw clothes, dishevelled, rumpled clotheson the floor and he smelt stale cigarette smoke and stale liquor. Thewindows were tight shut. Outside the bright sunlight had thrown adust-filled beam across the sill--a beam broken by the head of thewide wooden bed in which he had slept. He lay very quiet--comatose, drugged, his eyes wide, his mind clicking wildly like an unoiledmachine. 

It must have been thirty seconds after he perceived the sunbeam withthe dust on it and the rip on the large leather chair that he had thesense of life close beside him, and it was another thirty secondsafter that before that he realized that he was irrevocably married toJewel Hudson. 

He went out half an hour later and bought a revolver at a sportinggoods store. Then he took a took a taxi to the room where he had beenliving on East Twenty-seventh Street, and, leaning across the tablethat held his drawing materials, fired a cartridge into his head justbehind the temple. 

PORCELAIN AND PINK

_room in the down-stairs of a summer cottage. High around the wallruns an art frieze of a fisherman with a pile of nets at his feet anda ship on a crimson ocean, a fisherman with a pile of nets at his feetand a ship on a crimson ocean, a fisherman with a pile of nets at hisfeet and so on. In one place on the frieze there is an overlapping--herewe have half a fisherman with half a pile of nets at his foot, crowded damply against half a ship on half a crimson ocean. The frieze is not in the plot, but frankly it fascinates me. I couldcontinue indefinitely, but I am distracted by one of the two objectsin the room--a blue porcelain bath-tub. It has character, thisbath-tub. It is not one of the new racing bodies, but is small with ahigh tonneau and looks as if it were going to jump; discouraged, however, by the shortness of its legs, it has submitted to itsenvironment and to its coat of sky-blue paint. But it grumpily refusesto allow any patron completely to stretch his legs--which brings usneatly to the second object in the room:_

_is a girl--clearly an appendage to the bath-tub, only her head andthroat--beautiful girls have throats instead of necks--and asuggestion of shoulder appearing above the side. For the first tenminutes of the play the audience is engrossed in wondering if shereally is playing the game fairly and hasn't any clothes on or whetherit is being cheated and she is dressed. _

_The girl's name is_ JULIE MARVIS. _From the proud way she sitsup in the bath-tub we deduce that she is not very tall and that shecarries herself well. When she smiles, her upper tip rolls a littleand reminds you of an Easter Bunny, She is within whispering distanceof twenty years old. _

_One thing more--above and to the right of the bath-tub is a window. It is narrow and has a wide sill; it lets in much sunshine, buteffectually prevents any one who looks in from seeing the bath-tub. You begin to suspect the plot?_

_We open, conventionally enough, with a song, but, as the startledgasp of the audience quite drowns out the first half, we will giveonly the last of it:_

JULIE: (_In an airy sophrano--enthusiastico_)

 When Caesar did the Chicago He was a graceful child, Those sacred chickens Just raised the dickens The Vestal Virgins went wild. Whenever the Nervii got nervy He gave them an awful razz They shook is their shoes With the Consular blues The Imperial Roman Jazz

(_During the wild applause that follows_ JULIE _modestly movesher arms and makes waves on the surface of the water--at least wesuppose she does. Then the door on the left opens and_ LOIS MARVIS_enters, dressed but carrying garments and towels. _ LOIS _is ayear older than_ JULIE _and is nearly her double in face andvoice, but in her clothes and expression are the marks of theconservative. Yes, you've guessed it. Mistaken identity is the oldrusty pivot upon which the plot turns. _)

LOIS: (_Starting_) Oh, 'scuse me. I didn't know you were here. 

JULIE: Oh, hello. I'm giving a little concert--

LOIS: (_Interrupting_) Why didn't you lock the door?

JULIE: Didn't I?

LOIS: Of course you didn't. Do you think I just walked through it?

JULIE: I thought you picked the lock, dearest. 

LOIS: You're _so_ careless. 

JULIE: No. I'm happy as a garbage-man's dog and I'm giving a littleconcert. 

LOIS: (_Severely_) Grow up!

JULIE: (_Waving a pink arm around the room_) The walls reflectthe sound, you see. That's why there's something very beautiful aboutsinging in a bath-tub. It gives an effect of surpassing loveliness. Can I render you a selection?

LOIS: I wish you'd hurry out of the tub. 

JULIE: (_Shaking her head thoughtfully_) Can't be hurried. Thisis my kingdom at present, Godliness. 

LOIS: Why the mellow name?

JULIE: Because you're next to Cleanliness. Don't throw anythingplease!

LOIS: How long will you be?

JULIE: (_After some consideration_) Not less than fifteen normore than twenty-five minutes. 

LOIS: As a favor to me will you make it ten?

JULIE: (_Reminiscing_) Oh, Godliness, do you remember a day inthe chill of last January when one Julie, famous for her Easter-rabbitsmile, was going out and there was scarcely any hot water and youngJulie had just filled the tub for her own little self when the wickedsister came and did bathe herself therein, forcing the young Julie toperform her ablutions with cold cream--which is expensive and a darnlot of troubles?

LOIS: (_Impatiently_) Then you won't hurry?

JULIE: Why should I?

LOIS: I've got a date. 

JULIE: Here at the house?

LOIS: None of your business. 

(_JULIE shrugs the visible tips of her shoulders and stirs the waterinto ripples. _)

JULIE: So be it. 

LOIS: Oh, for Heaven's sake, yes! I have a date here, at the house--ina way. 

JULIE: In a way?

LOIS: He isn't coming in. He's calling for me and we're walking. 

JULIE: (_Raising her eyebrows_) Oh, the plot clears. It's thatliterary Mr. Calkins. I thought you promised mother you wouldn'tinvite him in. 

LOIS: (_Desperately_) She's so idiotic. She detests him becausehe's just got a divorce. Of course she's had more expedience than Ihave, but--

JULIE: (_Wisely_) Don't let her kid you! Experience is thebiggest gold brick in the world. All older people have it for sale. 

LOIS: I like him. We talk literature. 

JULIE: Oh, so that's why I've noticed all these weighty, books aroundthe house lately. 

LOIS: He lends them to me. 

JULIE: Well, you've got to play his game. When in Rome do as theRomans would like to do. But I'm through with books. I'm all educated. 

LOIS: You're very inconsistent--last summer you read every day. 

JULIE: If I were consistent I'd still be living on warm milk out of abottle. 

LOIS: Yes, and probably my bottle. But I like Mr. Calkins. 

JULIE: I never met him. 

LOIS: Well, will you hurry up?

JULIE: Yes. (_After a pause_) I wait till the water gets tepidand then I let in more hot. 

LOIS: (_Sarcastically_) How interesting!

JULIE: 'Member when we used to play "soapo"?

LOIS: Yes--and ten years old. I'm really quite surprised that youdon't play it still. 

JULIE: I do. I'm going to in a minute. 

LOIS: Silly game. 

JULIE: (_Warmly_) No, it isn't. It's good for the nerves. I'llbet you've forgotten how to play it. 

LOIS: (_Defiantly_) No, I haven't. You--you get the tub all fullof soapsuds and then you get up on the edge and slide down. 

JULIE: (_Shaking her head scornfully_) Huh! That's only part ofit. You've got to slide down without touching your hand or feet--

LOIS:(_Impatiently_) Oh, Lord! What do I care? I wish we'd eitherstop coming here in the summer or else get a house with two bath-tubs. 

JULIE: You can buy yourself a little tin one, or use the hose-----

LOIS: Oh, shut up!

JULIE: (_Irrelevantly_) Leave the towel. 

LOIS: What?

JULIE: Leave the towel when you go. 

LOIS: This towel?

JULIE: (_Sweetly_) Yes, I forgot my towel. 

LOIS: (_Looking around for the first time_) Why, you idiot! Youhaven't even a kimono. 

JULIE: (_Also looking around_) Why, so I haven't. 

LOIS: (_Suspicion growing on her_) How did you get here?

JULIE: (_Laughing_) I guess I--I guess I whisked here. You know--awhite form whisking down the stairs and--

LOIS: (_Scandalized_) Why, you little wretch. Haven't you anypride or self-respect?

JULIE: Lots of both. I think that proves it. I looked very well. Ireally am rather cute in my natural state. 

LOIS: Well, you--

JULIE: (_Thinking aloud_) I wish people didn't wear any clothes. I guess I ought to have been a pagan or a native or something. 

LOIS: You're a--

JULIE: I dreamt last night that one Sunday in church a small boybrought in a magnet that attracted cloth. He attracted the clothesright off of everybody; put them in an awful state; people were cryingand shrieking and carrying on as if they'd just discovered their skinsfor the first time. Only _I_ didn't care. So I just laughed. Ihad to pass the collection plate because nobody else would. 

LOIS: (_Who has turned a deaf ear to this speech_) Do you mean totell me that if I hadn't come you'd have run back to yourroom--un--unclothed?

JULIE: _Au naturel_ is so much nicer. 

LOIS: Suppose there had been some one in the living-room. 

JULIE: There never has been yet. 

LOIS: Yet! Good grief! How long--

JULIE: Besides, I usually have a towel. 

LOIS: (_Completely overcome_) Golly! You ought to be spanked. Ihope, you get caught. I hope there's a dozen ministers in theliving-room when you come out--and their wives, and their daughters. 

JULIE: There wouldn't be room for them in the living-room, answeredClean Kate of the Laundry District. 

LOIS: All right. You've made your own--bath-tub; you can lie in it. 

(_LOIS starts determinedly for the door. _)

JULIE: (_In alarm_) Hey! Hey! I don't care about the k'mono, butI want the towel. I can't dry myself on a piece of soap and a wetwash-rag. 

LOIS: (_Obstinately_). I won't humor such a creature. You'll haveto dry yourself the best way you can. You can roll on the floor likethe animals do that don't wear any clothes. 

JULIE: (_Complacent again_) All right. Get out!

LOIS: (_Haughtily_) Huh!

(JULIE _turns on the cold water and with her finger directs aparabolic stream at LOIS. LOIS retires quickly, slamming the doorafter her. JULIE laughs and turns off the water_)

JULIE: (Singing)

 When the Arrow-collar man Meets the D'jer-kiss girl On the smokeless Sante Fé Her Pebeco smile Her Lucile style De dum da-de-dum one day--

(_She changes to a whistle and leans forward to turn on the taps, but is startled by three loud banging noises in the pipes. Silence fora moment--then she puts her mouth down near the spigot as if it were atelephone_)

JULIE: Hello! (_No answer_) Are you a plumber? (_No answer_)Are you the water department? (_One loud, hollow bang_) What doyou want? (_No answer_) I believe you're a ghost. Are you? (_Noanswer_) Well, then, stop banging. (_She reaches out and turns onthe warm tap. No water flows. Again she puts her mouth down close tothe spigot_) If you're the plumber that's a mean trick. Turn it onfor a fellow. (_Two loud, hollow bangs_) Don't argue! I wantwater--water! _Water_!

(_A young man's head appears in the window--a head decorated with aslim mustache and sympathetic eyes. These last stare, and though theycan see nothing but many fishermen with nets and much crimson ocean, they decide him to speak_)

THE YOUNG MAN: Some one fainted?

JULIE: (_Starting up, all ears immediately_) Jumping cats!

THE YOUNG MAN: (_Helpfully_) Water's no good for fits. 

JULIE: Fits! Who said anything about fits!

THE YOUNG MAN: You said something about a cat jumping

JULIE: (_Decidedly_) I did not!

THE YOUNG MAN: Well, we can talk it over later, Are you ready to goout? Or do you still feel that if you go with me just now everybodywill gossip?

JULIE: (_Smiling_) Gossip! Would they? It'd be more thangossip--it'd be a regular scandal. 

THE YOUNG MAN: Here, you're going it a little strong. Your familymight be somewhat disgruntled--but to the pure all things aresuggestive. No one else would even give it a thought, except a few oldwomen. Come on. 

JULIE: You don't know what you ask. 

THE YOUNG MAN: Do you imagine we'd have a crowd following us?

JULIE: A crowd? There'd be a special, all-steel, buffet train leavingNew York hourly. 

THE YOUNG MAN: Say, are you house-cleaning?

JULIE: Why?

THE YOUNG MAN: I see all the pictures are off the walls. 

JULIE: Why, we never have pictures in this room. 

THE YOUNG MAN: Odd, I never heard of a room without pictures ortapestry or panelling or something. 

JULIE: There's not even any furniture in here. 

THE YOUNG MAN: What a strange house!

JULIE: It depend on the angle you see it from. 

THE YOUNG MAN: (_Sentimentally_) It's so nice talking to you likethis--when you're merely a voice. I'm rather glad I can't see you. 

JULIE; (_Gratefully_) So am I. 

THE YOUNG MAN: What color are you wearing?

JULIE: (_After a critical survey of her shoulders_) Why, I guessit's a sort of pinkish white. 

THE YOUNG MAN: Is it becoming to you?

JULIE: Very. It's--it's old. I've had it for a long while. 

THE YOUNG MAN: I thought you hated old clothes. 

JULIE: I do but this was a birthday present and I sort of have to wearit. 

THE YOUNG MAN: Pinkish-white. Well I'll bet it's divine. Is it instyle?

JULIE: Quite. It's very simple, standard model. 

THE YOUNG MAN: What a voice you have! How it echoes! Sometimes I shutmy eyes and seem to see you in a far desert island calling for me. AndI plunge toward you through the surf, hearing you call as you standthere, water stretching on both sides of you--

(_The soap slips from the side of the tub and splashes in. The youngman blinks_)

YOUNG MAN: What was that? Did I dream it?

JULIE: Yes. You're--you're very poetic, aren't you?

THE YOUNG MAN: (_Dreamily_) No. I do prose. I do verse only whenI am stirred. 

JULIE: (_Murmuring_) Stirred by a spoon--

THE YOUNG MAN: I have always loved poetry. I can remember to this daythe first poem I ever learned by heart. It was "Evangeline. "

JULIE: That's a fib. 

THE YOUNG MAN: Did I say "Evangeline"? I meant "The Skeleton inArmor. "

JULIE: I'm a low-brow. But I can remember my first poem. It had oneverse:

 Parker and Davis Sittin' on a fence Tryne to make a dollar Outa fif-teen cents. 

THE YOUNG MAN: (_Eagerly_) Are you growing fond of literature?

JULIE: If it's not too ancient or complicated or depressing. Same waywith people. I usually like 'em not too ancient or complicated ordepressing. 

THE YOUNG MAN: Of course I've read enormously. You told me last nightthat you were very fond of Walter Scott. 

JULIE: (_Considering_) Scott? Let's see. Yes, I've read "Ivanhoe"and "The Last of the Mohicans. "

THE YOUNG MAN: That's by Cooper. 

JULIE: (_Angrily_) "Ivanhoe" is? You're crazy! I guess I know. Iread it. THE YOUNG MAN: "The Last of the Mohicans" is by Cooper. 

JULIE: What do I care! I like O. Henry. I don't see how he ever wrotethose stories. Most of them he wrote in prison. "The Ballad of ReadingGaol" he made up in prison. 

THE YOUNG MAN: (_Biting his lip_) Literature--literature! Howmuch it has meant to me!

JULIE: Well, as Gaby Deslys said to Mr. Bergson, with my looks andyour brains there's nothing we couldn't do. 

THE YOUNG MAN: (_Laughing_) You certainly are hard to keep upwith. One day you're awfully pleasant and the next you're in a mood. If I didn't understand your temperament so well--

JULIE: (_Impatiently_) Oh, you're one of these amateurcharacter-readers, are you? Size people up in five minutes and thenlook wise whenever they're mentioned. I hate that sort of thing. 

THE YOUNG MAN: I don't boast of sizing you up. You're most mysterious, I'll admit. 

JULIE: There's only two mysterious people in history. 

THE YOUNG MAN: Who are they?

JULIE: The Man with the Iron Mask and the fella who says "ug uh-gluguh-glug uh-glug" when the line is busy. 

THE YOUNG MAN: You _are_ mysterious, I love you. You'rebeautiful, intelligent, and virtuous, and that's the rarest knowncombination. 

JULIE: You're a historian. Tell me if there are any bath-tubs inhistory. I think they've been frightfully neglected. 

THE YOUNG MAN: Bath-tubs! Let's see. Well, Agamemnon was stabbed inhis bath-tub. And Charlotte Corday stabbed Marat in his bath-tub. 

JULIE: (_Sighing_) Way back there! Nothing new besides the sun, is there? Why only yesterday I picked up a musical-comedy score thatmast have been at least twenty years old; and there on the cover itsaid "The Shimmies of Normandy, " but shimmie was spelt the old way, with a "C. "

THE YOUNG MAN: I loathe these modern dances. Oh, Lois, I wish I couldsee you. Come to the window. 

(_There is a loud bang in the water-pipe and suddenly the flowstarts from the open taps. Julie turns them off quickly_)

THE YOUNG MAN: (_Puzzled_) What on earth was that?

JULIE: (_Ingeniously_) I heard something, too. 

THE YOUNG MAN: Sounded like running water. 

JULIE: Didn't it? Strange like it. As a matter of fact I was fillingthe gold-fish bowl. 

THE YOUNG MAN: (_Still puzzled_) What was that banging noise?

JULIE: One of the fish snapping his golden jaws. 

THE YOUNG MAN: (_With sudden resolution_) Lois, I love you. I amnot a mundane man but I am a forger---

JULIE: (_Interested at once_) Oh, how fascinating. 

THE YOUNG MAN:--a forger ahead. Lois, I want you. 

JULIE: (_Skeptically_) Huh! What you really want is for the worldto come to attention and stand there till you give "Rest!"

THE YOUNG MAN: Lois I--Lois I--

(_He stops as Lois opens the door, comes in, and bangs it behindher. She looks peevishly at _JULIE _and then suddenly catchessight of the young man in the window_)

LOIS: (_In horror_) Mr. Calkins!

THE YOUNG MAN: (_Surprised_) Why I thought you said you werewearing pinkish white!

(_After one despairing stare _LOIS _ shrieks, throws up herhands in surrender, and sinks to the floor. _)

THE YOUNG MAN: (_In great alarm_) Good Lord! She's fainted! I'llbe right in. 

(JULIE'S _eyes light on the towel which has slipped from_ LOIS'S_inert hand. _)

JULIE: In that case I'll be right out. 

(_She puts her hands on the side of the tub to lift herself out anda murmur, half gasp, half sigh, ripples from the audience. 

A Belasco midnight comes guickly down and blots out the stage. _)

CURTAIN. 

_FANTASIES_

THE DIAMOND AS BIG AS THE RITZ

1

John T. Unger came from a family that had been well known in Hades--asmall town on the Mississippi River--for several generations. John'sfather had held the amateur golf championship through many a heatedcontest; Mrs. Unger was known "from hot-box to hot-bed, " as the localphrase went, for her political addresses; and young John T. Unger, whohad just turned sixteen, had danced all the latest dances from NewYork before he put on long trousers. And now, for a certain time, hewas to be away from home. That respect for a New England educationwhich is the bane of all provincial places, which drains them yearlyof their most promising young men, had seized upon his parents. Nothing would suit them but that he should go to St. Midas's Schoolnear Boston--Hades was too small to hold their darling and gifted son. 

Now in Hades--as you know if you ever have been there--the names ofthe more fashionable preparatory schools and colleges mean verylittle. The inhabitants have been so long out of the world that, though they make a show of keeping up-to-date in dress and manners andliterature, they depend to a great extent on hearsay, and a functionthat in Hades would be considered elaborate would doubtless be hailedby a Chicago beef-princess as "perhaps a little tacky. "

John T. Unger was on the eve of departure. Mrs. Unger, with maternalfatuity, packed his trunks full of linen suits and electric fans, andMr. Unger presented his son with an asbestos pocket-book stuffed withmoney. 

"Remember, you are always welcome here, " he said. "You can be sure, boy, that we'll keep the home fires burning. "

"I know, " answered John huskily. 

"Don't forget who you are and where you come from, " continued hisfather proudly, "and you can do nothing to harm you. You are anUnger--from Hades. "

So the old man and the young shook hands, and John walked away withtears streaming from his eyes. Ten minutes later he had passed outsidethe city limits and he stopped to glance back for the last time. Overthe gates the old-fashioned Victorian motto seemed strangelyattractive to him. His father had tried time and time again to have itchanged to something with a little more push and verve about it, suchas "Hades--Your Opportunity, " or else a plain "Welcome" sign set overa hearty handshake pricked out in electric lights. The old motto was alittle depressing, Mr. Unger had thought--but now . . . . 

So John took his look and then set his face resolutely toward hisdestination. And, as he turned away, the lights of Hades against thesky seemed full of a warm and passionate beauty. 

 * * * * *

St. Midas's School is half an hour from Boston in a Rolls-Piercemotor-car. The actual distance will never be known, for no one, exceptJohn T. Unger, had ever arrived there save in a Rolls-Pierce andprobably no one ever will again. St. Midas's is the most expensive andthe most exclusive boys' preparatory school in the world. 

John's first two years there passed pleasantly. The fathers of all theboys were money-kings, and John spent his summer visiting atfashionable resorts. While he was very fond of all the boys hevisited, their fathers struck him as being much of a piece, and in hisboyish way he often wondered at their exceeding sameness. When he toldthem where his home was they would ask jovially, "Pretty hot downthere?" and John would muster a faint smile and answer, "It certainlyis. " His response would have been heartier had they not all made thisjoke--at best varying it with, "Is it hot enough for you down there?"which he hated just as much. 

In the middle of his second year at school, a quiet, handsome boynamed Percy Washington had been put in John's form. The new-comer waspleasant in his manner and exceedingly well dressed even for St. Midas's, but for some reason he kept aloof from the other boys. Theonly person with whom he was intimate was John T. Unger, but even toJohn he was entirely uncommunicative concerning his home or hisfamily. That he was wealthy went without saying, but beyond a few suchdeductions John knew little of his friend, so it promised richconfectionery for his curiosity when Percy invited him to spend thesummer at his home "in the West. " He accepted, without hesitation. 

It was only when they were in the train that Percy became, for thefirst time, rather communicative. One day while they were eating lunchin the dining-car and discussing the imperfect characters of severalof the boys at school, Percy suddenly changed his tone and made anabrupt remark. 

"My father, " he said, "is by far the richest man in the world. "

"Oh, " said John politely. He could think of no answer to make to thisconfidence. He considered "That's very nice, " but it sounded hollowand was on the point of saying, "Really?" but refrained since it wouldseem to question Percy's statement. And such an astounding statementcould scarcely be questioned. 

"By far the richest, " repeated Percy. 

"I was reading in the _World Almanac_, " began John, "that therewas one man in America with an income of over five million a years andfour men with incomes of over three million a year, and---"

"Oh, they're nothing. " Percy's mouth was a half-moon of scorn. "Catch-penny capitalists, financial small-fry, petty merchants andmoney-lenders. My father could buy them out and not know he'd doneit. "

"But how does he---"

"Why haven't they put down _his_ income-tax? Because he doesn'tpay any. At least he pays a little one--but he doesn't pay any on his_real_ income. "

"He must be very rich, " said John simply, "I'm glad. I like very richpeople. 

"The richer a fella is, the better I like him. " There was a look ofpassionate frankness upon his dark face. "I visited theSchnlitzer-Murphys last Easter. Vivian Schnlitzer-Murphy had rubies asbig as hen's eggs, and sapphires that were like globes with lightsinside them---"

"I love jewels, " agreed Percy enthusiastically. "Of course I wouldn'twant any one at school to know about it, but I've got quite acollection myself. I used to collect them instead of stamps. "

"And diamonds, " continued John eagerly. "The Schnlitzer-Murphys haddiamonds as big as walnuts---"

"That's nothing. " Percy had leaned forward and dropped his voice to alow whisper. "That's nothing at all. My father has a diamond biggerthan the Ritz-Carlton Hotel. "

2

The Montana sunset lay between two mountains like a gigantic bruisefrom which dark arteries spread themselves over a poisoned sky. Animmense distance under the sky crouched the village of Fish, minute, dismal, and forgotten. There were twelve men, so it was said, in thevillage of Fish, twelve sombre and inexplicable souls who sucked alean milk from the almost literally bare rock upon which a mysteriouspopulatory force had begotten them. They had become a race apart, these twelve men of Fish, like some species developed by an early whimof nature, which on second thought had abandoned them to struggle andextermination. 

Out of the blue-black bruise in the distance crept a long line ofmoving lights upon the desolation of the land, and the twelve men ofFish gathered like ghosts at the shanty depot to watch the passing ofthe seven o'clock train, the Transcontinental Express from Chicago. Six times or so a year the Transcontinental Express, through someinconceivable jurisdiction, stopped at the village of Fish, and whenthis occurred a figure or so would disembark, mount into a buggy thatalways appeared from out of the dusk, and drive off toward the bruisedsunset. The observation of this pointless and preposterous phenomenonhad become a sort of cult among the men of Fish. To observe, that wasall; there remained in them none of the vital quality of illusionwhich would make them wonder or speculate, else a religion might havegrown up around these mysterious visitations. But the men of Fish werebeyond all religion--the barest and most savage tenets of evenChristianity could gain no foothold on that barren rock--so there wasno altar, no priest, no sacrifice; only each night at seven the silentconcourse by the shanty depot, a congregation who lifted up a prayerof dim, anaemic wonder. 

On this June night, the Great Brakeman, whom, had they deified anyone, they might well have chosen as their celestial protagonist, hadordained that the seven o'clock train should leave its human (orinhuman) deposit at Fish. At two minutes after seven Percy Washingtonand John T. Unger disembarked, hurried past the spellbound, the agape, the fearsome eyes of the twelve men of Fish, mounted into a buggywhich had obviously appeared from nowhere, and drove away. 

After half an hour, when the twilight had coagulated into dark, thesilent negro who was driving the buggy hailed an opaque body somewhereahead of them in the gloom. In response to his cry, it turned uponthem a luminous disc which regarded them like a malignant eye out ofthe unfathomable night. As they came closer, John saw that it was thetail-light of an immense automobile, larger and more magnificent thanany he had ever seen. Its body was of gleaming metal richer thannickel and lighter than silver, and the hubs of the wheels werestudded with iridescent geometric figures of green and yellow--Johndid not dare to guess whether they were glass or jewel. 

Two negroes, dressed in glittering livery such as one sees in picturesof royal processions in London, were standing at attention beside thecar and, as the two young men dismounted from the buggy, they weregreeted in some language which the guest could not understand, butwhich seemed to be an extreme form of the Southern negro's dialect. 

"Get in, " said Percy to his friend, as their trunks were tossed to theebony roof of the limousine. "Sorry we had to bring you this far inthat buggy, but of course it wouldn't do for the people on the trainor those God-forsaken fellas in Fish to see this automobile. "

"Gosh! What a car!" This ejaculation was provoked by its interior. John saw that the upholstery consisted of a thousand minute andexquisite tapestries of silk, woven with jewels and embroideries, andset upon a background of cloth of gold. The two armchair seats inwhich the boys luxuriated were covered with stuff that resembledduvetyn, but seemed woven in numberless colours of the ends of ostrichfeathers. 

"What a car!" cried John again, in amazement. 

"This thing?" Percy laughed. "Why, it's just an old junk we use for astation wagon. "

By this time they were gliding along through the darkness toward thebreak between the two mountains. 

"We'll be there in an hour and a half, " said Percy, looking at theclock. "I may as well tell you it's not going to be like anything youever saw before. "

If the car was any indication of what John would see, he was preparedto be astonished indeed. The simple piety prevalent in Hades has theearnest worship of and respect for riches as the first article of itscreed--had John felt otherwise than radiantly humble before them, hisparents would have turned away in horror at the blasphemy. 

They had now reached and were entering the break between the twomountains and almost immediately the way became much rougher. 

"If the moon shone down here, you'd see that we're in a big gulch, "said Percy, trying to peer out of the window. He spoke a few wordsinto the mouthpiece and immediately the footman turned on asearchlight and swept the hillsides with an immense beam. 

"Rocky, you see. An ordinary car would be knocked to pieces in half anhour. In fact, it'd take a tank to navigate it unless you knew theway. You notice we're going uphill now. "

They were obviously ascending, and within a few minutes the car wascrossing a high rise, where they caught a glimpse of a pale moon newlyrisen in the distance. The car stopped suddenly and several figurestook shape out of the dark beside it--these were negroes also. Againthe two young men were saluted in the same dimly recognisable dialect;then the negroes set to work and four immense cables dangling fromoverhead were attached with hooks to the hubs of the great jewelledwheels. At a resounding "Hey-yah!" John felt the car being liftedslowly from the ground--up and up--clear of the tallest rocks on bothsides--then higher, until he could see a wavy, moonlit valleystretched out before him in sharp contrast to the quagmire of rocksthat they had just left. Only on one side was there still rock--andthen suddenly there was no rock beside them or anywhere around. 

It was apparent that they had surmounted some immense knife-blade ofstone, projecting perpendicularly into the air. In a moment they weregoing down again, and finally with a soft bump they were landed uponthe smooth earth. 

"The worst is over, " said Percy, squinting out the window. "It's onlyfive miles from here, and our own road--tapestry brick--all the way. This belongs to us. This is where the United States ends, fathersays. "

"Are we in Canada?"

"We are not. We're in the middle of the Montana Rockies. But you arenow on the only five square miles of land in the country that's neverbeen surveyed. "

"Why hasn't it? Did they forget it?"

"No, " said Percy, grinning, "they tried to do it three times. Thefirst time my grandfather corrupted a whole department of the Statesurvey; the second time he had the official maps of the United Statestinkered with--that held them for fifteen years. The last time washarder. My father fixed it so that their compasses were in thestrongest magnetic field ever artificially set up. He had a whole setof surveying instruments made with a slight defection that would allowfor this territory not to appear, and he substituted them for the onesthat were to be used. Then he had a river deflected and he had whatlooked like a village up on its banks--so that they'd see it, andthink it was a town ten miles farther up the valley. There's only onething my father's afraid of, " he concluded, "only one thing in theworld that could be used to find us out. "

"What's that?"

Percy sank his voice to a whisper. 

"Aeroplanes, " he breathed. "We've got half a dozen anti-aircraft gunsand we've arranged it so far--but there've been a few deaths and agreat many prisoners. Not that we mind _that_, you know, fatherand I, but it upsets mother and the girls, and there's always thechance that some time we won't be able to arrange it. "

Shreds and tatters of chinchilla, courtesy clouds in the green moon'sheaven, were passing the green moon like precious Eastern stuffsparaded for the inspection of some Tartar Khan. It seemed to John thatit was day, and that he was looking at some lads sailing above him inthe air, showering down tracts and patent medicine circulars, withtheir messages of hope for despairing, rock-bound hamlets. It seemedto him that he could see them look down out of the clouds andstare--and stare at whatever there was to stare at in this placewhither he was bound--What then? Were they induced to land by someinsidious device to be immured far from patent medicines and fromtracts until the judgment day--or, should they fail to fall into thetrap, did a quick puff of smoke and the sharp round of a splittingshell bring them drooping to earth--and "upset" Percy's mother andsisters. John shook his head and the wraith of a hollow laugh issuedsilently from his parted lips. What desperate transaction lay hiddenhere? What a moral expedient of a bizarre Croesus? What terrible andgolden mystery?. . . 

The chinchilla clouds had drifted past now and, outside the Montananight was bright as day the tapestry brick of the road was smooth tothe tread of the great tyres as they rounded a still, moonlit lake;they passed into darkness for a moment, a pine grove, pungent andcool, then they came out into a broad avenue of lawn, and John'sexclamation of pleasure was simultaneous with Percy's taciturn "We'rehome. "

Full in the light of the stars, an exquisite château rose from theborders of the lake, climbed in marble radiance half the height of anadjoining mountain, then melted in grace, in perfect symmetry, intranslucent feminine languor, into the massed darkness of a forest ofpine. The many towers, the slender tracery of the sloping parapets, the chiselled wonder of a thousand yellow windows with their oblongsand hectagons and triangles of golden light, the shattered softness ofthe intersecting planes of star-shine and blue shade, all trembled onJohn's spirit like a chord of music. On one of the towers, thetallest, the blackest at its base, an arrangement of exterior lightsat the top made a sort of floating fairyland--and as John gazed up inwarm enchantment the faint acciaccare sound of violins drifted down ina rococo harmony that was like nothing he had ever beard before. Thenin a moment the car stepped before wide, high marble steps aroundwhich the night air was fragrant with a host of flowers. At the top ofthe steps two great doors swung silently open and amber light floodedout upon the darkness, silhouetting the figure of an exquisite ladywith black, high-piled hair, who held out her arms toward them. 

"Mother, " Percy was saying, "this is my friend, John Unger, fromHades. "

Afterward John remembered that first night as a daze of many colours, of quick sensory impressions, of music soft as a voice in love, and ofthe beauty of things, lights and shadows, and motions and faces. Therewas a white-haired man who stood drinking a many-hued cordial from acrystal thimble set on a golden stem. There was a girl with a floweryface, dressed like Titania with braided sapphires in her hair. Therewas a room where the solid, soft gold of the walls yielded to thepressure of his hand, and a room that was like a platonic conceptionof the ultimate prison--ceiling, floor, and all, it was lined with anunbroken mass of diamonds, diamonds of every size and shape, until, lit with tail violet lamps in the corners, it dazzled the eyes with awhiteness that could be compared only with itself, beyond human wish, or dream. 

Through a maze of these rooms the two boys wandered. Sometimes thefloor under their feet would flame in brilliant patterns from lightingbelow, patterns of barbaric clashing colours, of pastel delicacy, ofsheer whiteness, or of subtle and intricate mosaic, surely from somemosque on the Adriatic Sea. Sometimes beneath layers of thick crystalhe would see blue or green water swirling, inhabited by vivid fish andgrowths of rainbow foliage. Then they would be treading on furs ofevery texture and colour or along corridors of palest ivory, unbrokenas though carved complete from the gigantic tusks of dinosaurs extinctbefore the age of man . . . . 

Then a hazily remembered transition, and they were at dinner--whereeach plate was of two almost imperceptible layers of solid diamondbetween which was curiously worked a filigree of emerald design, ashaving sliced from green air. Music, plangent and unobtrusive, drifted down through far corridors--his chair, feathered and curvedinsidiously to his back, seemed to engulf and overpower him as hedrank his first glass of port. He tried drowsily to answer a questionthat had been asked him, but the honeyed luxury that clasped his bodyadded to the illusion of sleep--jewels, fabrics, wines, and metalsblurred before his eyes into a sweet mist . . . . 

"Yes, " he replied with a polite effort, "it certainly is hot enoughfor me down there. "

He managed to add a ghostly laugh; then, without movement, withoutresistance, he seemed to float off and away, leaving an iced dessertthat was pink as a dream . . . . He fell asleep. 

When he awoke he knew that several hours had passed. He was in a greatquiet room with ebony walls and a dull illumination that was toofaint, too subtle, to be called a light. His young host was standingover him. 

"You fell asleep at dinner, " Percy was saying. "I nearly did, too--itwas such a treat to be comfortable again after this year of school. Servants undressed and bathed you while you were sleeping. "

"Is this a bed or a cloud?" sighed John. "Percy, Percy--before you go, I want to apologise. "

"For what?"

"For doubting you when you said you had a diamond as big as theRitz-Carlton Hotel. "

Percy smiled. 

"I thought you didn't believe me. It's that mountain, you know. "

"What mountain?"

"The mountain the chateau rests on. It's not very big, for a mountain. But except about fifty feet of sod and gravel on top it's soliddiamond. _One_ diamond, one cubic mile without a flaw. Aren't youlistening? Say----"

But John T. Unger had again fallen asleep. 

3

Morning. As he awoke he perceived drowsily that the room had at thesame moment become dense with sunlight. The ebony panels of one wallhad slid aside on a sort of track, leaving his chamber half open tothe day. A large negro in a white uniform stood beside his bed. 

"Good-evening, " muttered John, summoning his brains from the wildplaces. 

"Good-morning, sir. Are you ready for your bath, sir? Oh, don't getup--I'll put you in, if you'll just unbutton your pyjamas--there. Thank you, sir. "

John lay quietly as his pyjamas were removed--he was amused anddelighted; he expected to be lifted like a child by this blackGargantua who was tending him, but nothing of the sort happened;instead he felt the bed tilt up slowly on its side--he began to roll, startled at first, in the direction of the wall, but when he reachedthe wall its drapery gave way, and sliding two yards farther down afleecy incline he plumped gently into water the same temperature ashis body. 

He looked about him. The runway or rollway on which he had arrived hadfolded gently back into place. He had been projected into anotherchamber and was sitting in a sunken bath with his head just above thelevel of the floor. All about him, lining the walls of the room andthe sides and bottom of the bath itself, was a blue aquarium, andgazing through the crystal surface on which he sat, he could see fishswimming among amber lights and even gliding without curiosity pasthis outstretched toes, which were separated from them only by thethickness of the crystal. From overhead, sunlight came down throughsea-green glass. 

"I suppose, sir, that you'd like hot rosewater and soapsuds thismorning, sir--and perhaps cold salt water to finish. "

The negro was standing beside him. 

"Yes, " agreed John, smiling inanely, "as you please. " Any idea ofordering this bath according to his own meagre standards of livingwould have been priggish and not a little wicked. 

The negro pressed a button and a warm rain began to fall, apparentlyfrom overhead, but really, so John. Discovered after a moment, from afountain arrangement near by. The water turned to a pale rose colourand jets of liquid soap spurted into it from four miniature walrusheads at the corners of the bath. In a moment a dozen littlepaddle-wheels, fixed to the sides, had churned the mixture into aradiant rainbow of pink foam which enveloped him softly with itsdelicious lightness, and burst in shining, rosy bubbles here and thereabout him. 

"Shall I turn on the moving-picture machine, sir?" suggested the negrodeferentially. "There's a good one-reel comedy in this machine to-day, or I can put in a serious piece in a moment, if you prefer it. 

"No, thanks, " answered John, politely but firmly. He was enjoying hisbath too much to desire any distraction. But distraction came. In amoment he was listening intently to the sound of flutes from justoutside, flutes dripping a melody that was like a waterfall, cool andgreen as the room itself, accompanying a frothy piccolo, in play morefragile than the lace of suds that covered and charmed him. 

After a cold salt-water bracer and a cold fresh finish, he stepped outand into a fleecy robe, and upon a couch covered with the samematerial he was rubbed with oil, alcohol, and spice. Later he sat in avoluptuous while he was shaved and his hair was trimmed. 

"Mr. Percy is waiting in your sitting-room, " said the negro, whenthese operations were finished. "My name is Gygsum, Mr. Unger, sir. Iam to see to Mr. Unger every morning. "

John walked out into the brisk sunshine of his living-room, where hefound breakfast waiting for him and Percy, gorgeous in white kidknickerbockers, smoking in an easy chair. 

4

This is a story of the Washington family as Percy sketched it for Johnduring breakfast. 

The father of the present Mr. Washington had been a Virginian, adirect descendant of George Washington, and Lord Baltimore. At theclose of the Civil War he was a twenty-five-year-old Colonel with aplayed-out plantation and about a thousand dollars in gold. 

Fitz-Norman Culpepper Washington, for that was the young Colonel'sname, decided to present the Virginia estate to his younger brotherand go West. He selected two dozen of the most faithful blacks, who, of course, worshipped him, and bought twenty-five tickets to the West, where he intended to take out land in their names and start a sheepand cattle ranch. 

When he had been in Montana for less than a month and things weregoing very poorly indeed, he stumbled on his great discovery. He hadlost his way when riding the room and the sides and bottom of the bathitself was a blue aquarium, and gazing through the crystal surface onwhich he sat, he could see fish swimming among amber lights and evengliding without curiosity past his outstretched toes, which wereseparated from them only by the thickness of the crystal. Fromoverhead, sunlight came down through sea-green glass. 

"I suppose, sir, that you'd like hot rosewater and soapsuds thismorning, sir--and perhaps cold salt water to finish. "

The negro was standing beside him. 

"Yes, " agreed John, smiling inanely, "as you please, "; Any idea ofordering this bath according to his own meagre standards of livingwould have been priggish and not a little wicked. 

The negro pressed a button and a warm rain began to fall, apparentlyfrom overhead, but really, so John discovered after a moment, from afountain arrangement near by. The water turned to a pale rose colourand jets of liquid soap spurted into it from four miniature walrusheads at the corners of the bath. In a moment a dozen littlepaddle-wheels, fixed to the sides, had churned the mixture into aradiant rainbow of pink foam which enveloped him softly with itsdelicious lightness, and burst in shining, rosy bubbles here and thereabout him. 

"Shall I turn on the moving-picture machine, sir?" suggested the negrodeferentially. "There's a good one-reel comedy in this machine to-day, or I can put in a serious piece in a moment, if you prefer it. "

"No, thanks, " answered John, politely but firmly, He was enjoying hisbath too much to desire any distraction. But distraction came. In amoment he was listening intently to the sound of flutes from justoutside, flutes dripping a melody that was like a waterfall, cool andgreen as the room itself, accompanying a frothy piccolo, in play morefragile than the lace of suds that covered and charmed him. 

After a cold salt-water bracer and a cold fresh finish, he stepped outand into a fleecy robe, and upon a couch covered with the samematerial he was rubbed with oil, alcohol, and spice. Later he sat in avoluptuous chair while he was shaved and his hair was trimmed. 

"Mr. Percy is waiting in your sitting-room, " said the negro, whenthese operations were finished. "My name is Gygsum, Mr. Unger, sir. Iam to see to Mr. Unger every morning. "

John walked out into the brisk sunshine of his living-room, where hefound breakfast waiting for him and Percy, gorgeous in white kidknickerbockers, smoking in an easy chair. 

4

This is a story of the Washington family as Percy sketched it for Johnduring breakfast. 

The father of the present Mr. Washington had been a Virginian, adirect descendant of George Washington, and Lord Baltimore. At theclose of the Civil War he was a twenty-five-year-old Colonel with aplayed-out plantation and about a thousand dollars in gold. 

Fitz-Norman Culpepper Washington, for that was the young Colonel'sname, decided to present the Virginia estate to his younger brotherand go West, He selected two dozen of the most faithful blacks, who, of course, worshipped him, and bought twenty-five tickets to the West, where he intended to take out land in their names and start a sheepand cattle ranch. 

When he had been in Montana for less than a month and things weregoing very poorly indeed, he stumbled on his great discovery. He hadlost his way when riding in the hills, and after a day without food hebegan to grow hungry. As he was without his rifle, he was forced topursue a squirrel, and, in the course of the pursuit, he noticed thatit was carrying something shiny in its mouth. Just before it vanishedinto its hole--for Providence did not intend that this squirrel shouldalleviate his hunger--it dropped its burden. Sitting down to considerthe situation Fitz-Norman's eye was caught by a gleam in the grassbeside him. In ten seconds he had completely lost his appetite andgained one hundred thousand dollars. The squirrel, which had refusedwith annoying persistence to become food, had made him a present of alarge and perfect diamond. 

Late that night he found his way to camp and twelve hours later allthe males among his darkies were back by the squirrel hole diggingfuriously at the side of the mountain. He told them he had discovereda rhinestone mine, and, as only one or two of them had ever seen evena small diamond before, they believed him, without question. When themagnitude of his discovery became apparent to him, he found himself ina quandary. The mountain was _a_ diamond--it was literallynothing else but solid diamond. He filled four saddle bags full ofglittering samples and started on horseback for St. Paul. There hemanaged to dispose of half a dozen small stones--when he tried alarger one a storekeeper fainted and Fitz-Norman was arrested as apublic disturber. He escaped from jail and caught the train for NewYork, where he sold a few medium-sized diamonds and received inexchange about two hundred thousand dollars in gold. But he did notdare to produce any exceptional gems--in fact, he left New York justin time. Tremendous excitement had been created in jewellery circles, not so much by the size of his diamonds as by their appearance in thecity from mysterious sources. Wild rumours became current that adiamond mine had been discovered in the Catskills, on the Jerseycoast, on Long Island, beneath Washington Square. Excursion trains, packed with men carrying picks and shovels, began to leave New Yorkhourly, bound for various neighbouring El Dorados. But by that timeyoung Fitz-Norman was on his way back to Montana. 

By the end of a fortnight he had estimated that the diamond in themountain was approximately equal in quantity to all the rest of thediamonds known to exist in the world. There was no valuing it by anyregular computation, however, for it was _one solid diamond_--andif it were offered for sale not only would the bottom fall out of themarket, but also, if the value should vary with its size in the usualarithmetical progression, there would not be enough gold in the worldto buy a tenth part of it. And what could any one do with a diamondthat size?

It was an amazing predicament. He was, in one sense, the richest manthat ever lived--and yet was he worth anything at all? If his secretshould transpire there was no telling to what measures the Governmentmight resort in order to prevent a panic, in gold as well as injewels. They might take over the claim immediately and institute amonopoly. 

There was no alternative--he must market his mountain in secret. Hesent South for his younger brother and put him in charge of hiscoloured following, darkies who had never realised that slavery wasabolished. To make sure of this, he read them a proclamation that hehad composed, which announced that General Forrest had reorganised theshattered Southern armies and defeated the North in one pitchedbattle. The negroes believed him implicitly. They passed a votedeclaring it a good thing and held revival services immediately. 

Fitz-Norman himself set out for foreign parts with one hundredthousand dollars and two trunks filled with rough diamonds of allsizes. He sailed for Russia in a Chinese junk, and six months afterhis departure from Montana he was in St. Petersburg. He took obscurelodgings and called immediately upon the court jeweller, announcingthat he had a diamond for the Czar. He remained in St. Petersburg fortwo weeks, in constant danger of being murdered, living from lodgingto lodging, and afraid to visit his trunks more than three or fourtimes during the whole fortnight. 

On his promise to return in a year with larger and finer stones, hewas allowed to leave for India. Before he left, however, the CourtTreasurers had deposited to his credit, in American banks, the sum offifteen million dollars--under four different aliases. 

He returned to America in 1868, having been gone a little over twoyears. He had visited the capitals of twenty-two countries and talkedwith five emperors, eleven kings, three princes, a shah, a khan, and asultan. At that time Fitz-Norman estimated his own wealth at onebillion dollars. One fact worked consistently against the disclosureof his secret. No one of his larger diamonds remained in the publiceye for a week before being invested with a history of enoughfatalities, amours, revolutions, and wars to have occupied it from thedays of the first Babylonian Empire. 

From 1870 until his death in 1900, the history of Fitz-NormanWashington was a long epic in gold. There were side issues, ofcourse--he evaded the surveys, he married a Virginia lady, by whom hehad a single son, and he was compelled, due to a series of unfortunatecomplications, to murder his brother, whose unfortunate habit ofdrinking himself into an indiscreet stupor had several timesendangered their safety. But very other murders stained these happyyears of progress and exspansion. 

Just before he died he changed his policy, and with all but a fewmillion dollars of his outside wealth bought up rare minerals in bulk, which he deposited in the safety vaults of banks all over the world, marked as bric-a-brac. His son, Braddock Tarleton Washington, followedthis policy on an even more tensive scale. The minerals were convertedinto the rarest of all elements--radium--so that the equivalent of abillion dollars in gold could be placed in a receptacle no bigger thana cigar box. 

When Fitz-Norman had been dead three years his son, Braddock, decidedthat the business had gone far enough. The amount of wealth that heand his father had taken out of the mountain was beyond all exactcomputation. He kept a note-book in cipher in which he set down theapproximate quantity of radium in each of the thousand banks hepatronised, and recorded the alias under which it was held. Then hedid a very simple thing--he sealed up the mine. 

He sealed up the mine. What had been taken out of it would support allthe Washingtons yet to be born in unparalleled luxury for generations. His one care must be the protection of his secret, lest in thepossible panic attendant on its discovery he should be reduced withall the property-holders in the world to utter poverty. 

This was the family among whom John T. Unger was staying. This was thestory he heard in his silver-walled living-room the morning after hisarrival. 

5

After breakfast, John found his way out the great marble entrance, andlooked curiously at the scene before him. The whole valley, from thediamond mountain to the steep granite cliff five miles away, stillgave off a breath of golden haze which hovered idly above the finesweep of lawns and lakes and gardens. Here and there clusters of elmsmade delicate groves of shade, contrasting strangely with the toughmasses of pine forest that held the hills in a grip of dark-bluegreen. Even as John looked he saw three fawns in single file patterout from one clump about a half-mile away and disappear with awkwardgaiety into the black-ribbed half-light of another. John would nothave been surprised to see a goat-foot piping his way among the treesor to catch a glimpse of pink nymph-skin and flying yellow hairbetween the greenest of the green leaves. 

In some such cool hope he descended the marble steps, disturbingfaintly the sleep of two silky Russian wolfhounds at the bottom, andset off along a walk of white and blue brick that seemed to lead in noparticular direction. 

He was enjoying himself as much as he was able. It is youth's felicityas well as its insufficiency that it can never live in the present, but must always be measuring up the day against its own radiantlyimagined future--flowers and gold, girls and stars, they are onlyprefigurations and prophecies of that incomparable, unattainable youngdream. 

John rounded a soft corner where the massed rosebushes filled the airwith heavy scent, and struck off across a park toward a patch of mossunder some trees. He had never lain upon moss, and he wanted to seewhether it was really soft enough to justify the use of its name as anadjective. Then he saw a girl coming toward him over the grass. Shewas the most beautiful person he had ever seen. 

She was dressed in a white little gown that came just below her knees, and a wreath of mignonettes clasped with blue slices of sapphire boundup her hair. Her pink bare feet scattered the dew before them as shecame. She was younger than John--not more than sixteen. 

"Hallo, " she cried softly, "I'm Kismine. "

She was much more than that to John already. He advanced toward her, scarcely moving as he drew near lest he should tread on her bare toes. 

"You haven't met me, " said her soft voice. Her blue eyes added, "Oh, but you've missed a great deal!". . . "You met my sister, Jasmine, lastnight. I was sick with lettuce poisoning, " went on her soft voice, andher eye continued, "and when I'm sick I'm sweet--and when I'm well. "

"You have made an enormous impression on me, " said John's eyes, "andI'm not so slow myself"--"How do you do?" said his voice. "I hopeyou're better this morning. "--"You darling, " added his eyestremulously. 

John observed that they had been walking along the path. On hersuggestion they sat down together upon the moss, the softness of whichhe failed to determine. 

He was critical about women. A single defect--a thick ankle, a hoarsevoice, a glass eye--was enough to make him utterly indifferent. Andhere for the first time in his life he was beside a girl who seemed tohim the incarnation of physical perfection. 

"Are you from the East?" asked Kismine with charming interest. 

"No, " answered John simply. "I'm from Hades. "

Either she had never heard of Hades, or she could think of no pleasantcomment to make upon it, for she did not discuss it further. 

"I'm going East to school this fall" she said. "D'you think I'll likeit? I'm going to New York to Miss Bulge's. It's very strict, but yousee over the weekends I'm going to live at home with the family in ourNew York house, because father heard that the girls had to go walkingtwo by two. "

"Your father wants you to be proud, " observed John. 

"We are, " she answered, her eyes shining with dignity. "None of us hasever been punished. Father said we never should be. Once when mysister Jasmine was a little girl she pushed him downstairs and he justgot up and limped away. 

"Mother was--well, a little startled, " continued Kismine, "when sheheard that you were from--from where you _are_ from, you know. She said that when she was a young girl--but then, you see, she's aSpaniard and old-fashioned. "

"Do you spend much time out here?" asked John, to conceal the factthat he was somewhat hurt by this remark. It seemed an unkind allusionto his provincialism. 

"Percy and Jasmine and I are here every summer, but next summerJasmine is going to Newport. She's coming out in London a year fromthis fall. She'll be presented at court. "

"Do you know, " began John hesitantly, "you're much more sophisticatedthan I thought you were when I first saw you?"

"Oh, no, I'm not, " she exclaimed hurriedly. "Oh, I wouldn't think ofbeing. I think that sophisticated young people are _terribly_common, don't you? I'm not all, really. If you say I am, I'm going tocry. "

She was so distressed that her lip was trembling. John was impelled toprotest:

"I didn't mean that; I only said it to tease you. "

"Because I wouldn't mind if I _were_, " she persisted, "but I'mnot. I'm very innocent and girlish. I never smoke, or drink, or readanything except poetry. I know scarcely any mathematics or chemistry. I dress _very_ simply--in fact, I scarcely dress at all. I thinksophisticated is the last thing you can say about me. I believe thatgirls ought to enjoy their youths in a wholesome way. "

"I do, too, " said John, heartily, Kismine was cheerful again. She smiled at him, and a still-born teardripped from the comer of one blue eye. 

"I like you, " she whispered intimately. "Are you going to spend allyour time with Percy while you're here, or will you be nice to me?Just think--I'm absolutely fresh ground. I've never had a boy in lovewith me in all my life. I've never been allowed even to _see_boys alone--except Percy. I came all the way out here into this grovehoping to run into you, where the family wouldn't be around. "

Deeply flattered, John bowed from the hips as he had been taught atdancing school in Hades. 

"We'd better go now, " said Kismine sweetly. "I have to be with motherat eleven. You haven't asked me to kiss you once. I thought boysalways did that nowadays"

John drew himself up proudly. 

"Some of them do, " he answered, "but not me. Girls don't do that sortof thing--in Hades. "

Side by side they walked back toward the house. 

6

John stood facing Mr. Braddock Washington in the full sunlight. Theelder man was about forty, with a proud, vacuous face, intelligenteyes, and a robust figure. In the mornings he smelt of horses--thebest horses. He carried a plain walking-stick of gray birch with asingle large opal for a grip. He and Percy were showing John around. 

"The slaves' quarters are there. " His walking-stick indicated acloister of marble on their left that ran in graceful Gothic along theside of the mountain. "In my youth I was distracted for a while fromthe business of life by a period of absurd idealism. During that timethey lived in luxury. For instance, I equipped every one of theirrooms with a tile bath. "

"I suppose, " ventured John, with an ingratiating laugh, "that theyused the bathtubs to keep coal in. Mr. Schnlitzer-Murphy told me thatonce he---"

"The opinions of Mr. Schnlitzer-Murphy are of little importance, Ishould imagine, " interrupted Braddock Washington coldly. "My slavesdid not keep coal in their bathtubs. They had orders to bathe everyday, and they did. If they hadn't I might have ordered a sulphuricacid shampoo. I discontinued the baths for quite another reason. Several of them caught cold and died. Water is not good for certainraces--except as a beverage. "

John laughed, and then decided to nod his head in sober agreement. Braddock Washington made him uncomfortable. 

"All these negroes are descendants of the ones my father brought Northwith him. There are about two hundred and fifty now. You notice thatthey've lived so long apart from the world that their original dialecthas become an almost indistinguishable patois. We bring a few of themup to speak English--my secretary and two or three of the houseservants. 

"This is the golf course, " he continued, as they strolled along thevelvet winter grass. "It's all a green, you see--no fairway, no rough, no hazards. "

He smiled pleasantly at John. 

"Many men in the cage, father?" asked Percy suddenly. 

Braddock Washington stumbled, and let forth an involuntary curse. 

"One less than there should be, " he ejaculated darkly--and then addedafter a moment, "We've had difficulties. "

"Mother was telling me, " exclaimed Percy, "that Italian teacher---"

"A ghastly error, " said Braddock Washington angrily. "But of coursethere's a good chance that we may have got him. Perhaps he fellsomewhere in the woods or stumbled over a cliff. And then there'salways the probability that if he did get away his story wouldn't bebelieved. Nevertheless, I've had two dozen men looking for him indifferent towns around here. "

"And no luck?"

"Some. Fourteen of them reported to my agent they'd each killed a mananswering to that description, but of course it was probably only thereward they were after---"

He broke off. They had come to a large cavity in the earth about thecircumference of a merry-go-round, and covered by a strong irongrating. Braddock Washington beckoned to John, and pointed his canedown through the grating. John stepped to the edge and gazed. Immediately his ears were assailed by a wild clamor from below. 

"Come on down to Hell!"

"Hallo, kiddo, how's the air up there?"

"Hey! Throw us a rope!"

"Got an old doughnut, Buddy, or a couple of second-hand sandwiches?"

"Say, fella, if you'll push down that guy you're with, we'll show youa quick disappearance scene. "

"Paste him one for me, will you?"

It was too dark to see clearly into the pit below, but John could tellfrom the coarse optimism and rugged vitality of the remarks and voicesthat they proceeded from middle-class Americans of the more spiritedtype. Then Mr. Washington put out his cane and touched a button in thegrass, and the scene below sprang into light. 

"These are some adventurous mariners who had the misfortune todiscover El Dorado, " he remarked. 

Below them there had appeared a large hollow in the earth shaped likethe interior of a bowl. The sides were steep and apparently ofpolished glass, and on its slightly concave surface stood about twodozen men clad in the half costume, half uniform, of aviators. Theirupturned faces, lit with wrath, with malice, with despair, withcynical humour, were covered by long growths of beard, but with theexception of a few who had pined perceptibly away, they seemed to be awell-fed, healthy lot. 

Braddock Washington drew a garden chair to the edge of the pit and satdown. 

"Well, how are you, boys?" he inquired genially. 

A chorus of execration, in which all joined except a few toodispirited to cry out, rose up into the sunny air, but BraddockWashington heard it with unruffled composure. When its last echo haddied away he spoke again. 

"Have you thought up a way out of your difficulty?"

From here and there among them a remark floated up. 

"We decided to stay here for love!"

"Bring us up there and we'll find us a way!"

Braddock Washington waited until they were again quiet. Then he said:

"I've told you the situation. I don't want you here, I wish to heavenI'd never seen you. Your own curiosity got you here, and any time thatyou can think of a way out which protects me and my interests I'll beglad to consider it. But so long as you confine your efforts todigging tunnels--yes, I know about the new one you've started--youwon't get very far. This isn't as hard on you as you make it out, withall your howling for the loved ones at home. If you were the type whoworried much about the loved ones at home, you'd never have taken upaviation. "

A tall man moved apart from the others, and held up his hand to callhis captor's attention to what he was about to say. 

"Let me ask you a few questions!" he cried. "You pretend to be afair-minded man. "

"How absurd. How could a man of _my_ position be fair-mindedtoward you? You might as well speak of a Spaniard being fair-mindedtoward a piece of steak. "

At this harsh observation the faces of the two dozen fell, but thetall man continued:

"All right!" he cried. "We've argued this out before. You're not ahumanitarian and you're not fair-minded, but you're human--at leastyou say you are--and you ought to be able to put yourself in our placefor long enough to think how--how--how--"

"How what?" demanded Washington, coldly. 

"--how unnecessary--"

"Not to me. "

"Well--how cruel--"

"We've covered that. Cruelty doesn't exist where self-preservation isinvolved. You've been soldiers; you know that. Try another. "

"Well, then, how stupid. "

"There, " admitted Washington, "I grant you that. But try to think ofan alternative. I've offered to have all or any of you painlesslyexecuted if you wish. I've offered to have your wives, sweethearts, children, and mothers kidnapped and brought out here. I'll enlargeyour place down there and feed and clothe you the rest of your lives. If there was some method of producing permanent amnesia I'd have allof you operated on and released immediately, somewhere outside of mypreserves. But that's as far as my ideas go. "

"How about trusting us not to peach on you?" cried some one. 

"You don't proffer that suggestion seriously, " said Washington, withan expression of scorn. "I did take out one man to teach my daughterItalian. Last week he got away. "

A wild yell of jubilation went up suddenly from two dozen throats anda pandemonium of joy ensued. The prisoners clog-danced and cheered andyodled and wrestled with one another in a sudden uprush of animalspirits. They even ran up the glass sides of the bowl as far as theycould, and slid back to the bottom upon the natural cushions of theirbodies. The tall man started a song in which they all joined--

 "_Oh, we'll hang the kaiser On a sour apple-tree_--"

Braddock Washington sat in inscrutable silence until the song wasover. 

"You see, " he remarked, when he could gain a modicum of attention. "Ibear you no ill-will. I like to see you enjoying yourselves. That'swhy I didn't tell you the whole story at once. The man--what was hisname? Critchtichiello?--was shot by some of my agents in fourteendifferent places. "

Not guessing that the places referred to were cities, the tumult ofrejoicing subsided immediately. 

"Nevertheless, " cried Washington with a touch of anger, "he tried torun away. Do you expect me to take chances with any of you after anexperience like that?"

Again a series of ejaculations went up. 

"Sure!"

"Would your daughter like to learn Chinese?"

"Hey, I can speak Italian! My mother was a wop. "

"Maybe she'd like t'learna speak N'Yawk!"

"If she's the little one with the big blue eyes I can teach her a lotof things better than Italian. "

"I know some Irish songs--and I could hammer brass once't. "

Mr. Washington reached forward suddenly with his cane and pushed thebutton in the grass so that the picture below went out instantly, andthere remained only that great dark mouth covered dismally with theblack teeth of the grating. 

"Hey!" called a single voice from below, "you ain't goin' away withoutgivin' us your blessing?"

But Mr. Washington, followed by the two boys, was already strolling ontoward the ninth hole of the golf course, as though the pit and itscontents were no more than a hazard over which his facile iron hadtriumphed with ease. 

7

July under the lee of the diamond mountain was a month of blanketnights and of warm, glowing days. John and Kismine were in love. Hedid not know that the little gold football (inscribed with the legend_Pro deo et patria et St. Mida_) which he had given her rested ona platinum chain next to her bosom. But it did. And she for her partwas not aware that a large sapphire which had dropped one day from hersimple coiffure was stowed away tenderly in John's jewel box. 

Late one afternoon when the ruby and ermine music room was quiet, theyspent an hour there together. He held her hand and she gave him such alook that he whispered her name aloud. She bent toward him--thenhesitated. 

"Did you say 'Kismine'?" she asked softly, "or--"

She had wanted to be sure. She thought she might have misunderstood. 

Neither of them had ever kissed before, but in the course of an hourit seemed to make little difference. 

The afternoon drifted away. That night, when a last breath of musicdrifted down from the highest tower, they each lay awake, happilydreaming over the separate minutes of the day. They had decided to bemarried as soon as possible. 

8

Every day Mr. Washington and the two young men went hunting or fishingin the deep forests or played golf around the somnolent course--gameswhich John diplomatically allowed his host to win--or swam in themountain coolness of the lake. John found Mr. Washington a somewhatexacting personality--utterly uninterested in any ideas or opinionsexcept his own. Mrs. Washington was aloof and reserved at all times. She was apparently indifferent to her two daughters, and entirelyabsorbed in her son Percy, with whom she held interminableconversations in rapid Spanish at dinner. 

Jasmine, the elder daughter, resembled Kismine in appearance--exceptthat she was somewhat bow-legged, and terminated in large hands andfeet--but was utterly unlike her in temperament. Her favourite bookshad to do with poor girls who kept house for widowed fathers. Johnlearned from Kismine that Jasmine had never recovered from the shockand disappointment caused her by the termination of the World War, just as she was about to start for Europe as a canteen expert. She hadeven pined away for a time, and Braddock Washington had taken steps topromote a new war in the Balkans--but she had seen a photograph ofsome wounded Serbian soldiers and lost interest in the wholeproceedings. But Percy and Kismine seemed to have inherited thearrogant attitude in all its harsh magnificence from their father. Achaste and consistent selfishness ran like a pattern through theirevery idea. 

John was enchanted by the wonders of the château and the valley. Braddock Washington, so Percy told him, had caused to be kidnapped alandscape gardener, an architect, a designer of state settings, and aFrench decadent poet left over from the last century. He had put hisentire force of negroes at their disposal, guaranteed to supply themwith any materials that the world could offer, and left them to workout some ideas of their own. But one by one they had shown theiruselessness. The decadent poet had at once begun bewailing hisseparation, from the boulevards in spring--he made some vague remarksabout spices, apes, and ivories, but said nothing that was of anypractical value. The stage designer on his part wanted to make thewhole valley a series of tricks and sensational effects--a state ofthings that the Washingtons would soon have grown tired of. And as forthe architect and the landscape gardener, they thought only in termsof convention. They must make this like this and that like that. 

But they had, at least, solved the problem of what was to be done withthem--they all went mad early one morning after spending the night ina single room trying to agree upon the location of a fountain, andwere now confined comfortably in an insane asylum at Westport, Connecticut. 

"But, " inquired John curiously, "who did plan all your wonderfulreception rooms and halls, and approaches and bathrooms---?"

"Well, " answered Percy, "I blush to tell you, but it was amoving-picture fella. He was the only man we found who was used toplaying with an unlimited amount of money, though he did tuck hisnapkin in his collar and couldn't read or write. "

As August drew to a close John began to regret that he must soon goback to school. He and Kismine had decided to elope the followingJune. 

"It would be nicer to be married here, " Kismine confessed, "but ofcourse I could never get father's permission to marry you at all. Nextto that I'd rather elope. It's terrible for wealthy people to bemarried in America at present--they always have to send out bulletinsto the press saying that they're going to be married in remnants, whenwhat they mean is just a peck of old second-hand pearls and some usedlace worn once by the Empress Eugenie. "

"I know, " agreed John fervently. "When I was visiting theSchnlitzer-Murphys, the eldest daughter, Gwendolyn, married a manwhose father owns half of West Virginia. She wrote home saying what atough struggle she was carrying on on his salary as a bank clerk--andthen she ended up by saying that 'Thank God, I have four good maidsanyhow, and that helps a little. '"

"It's absurd, " commented Kismine--"Think of the millions and millionsof people in the world, labourers and all, who get along with only twomaids. "

One afternoon late in August a chance remark of Kismine's changed theface of the entire situation, and threw John into a state of terror. 

They were in their favourite grove, and between kisses John wasindulging in some romantic forebodings which he fancied addedpoignancy to their relations. 

"Sometimes I think we'll never marry, " he said sadly. "You're toowealthy, too magnificent. No one as rich as you are can be like othergirls. I should marry the daughter of some well-to-do wholesalehardware man from Omaha or Sioux City, and be content with herhalf-million. "

"I knew the daughter of a wholesale hardware man once, " remarkedKismine. "I don't think you'd have been contented with her. She was afriend of my sister's. She visited here. "

"Oh, then you've had other guests?" exclaimed John in surprise. 

Kismine seemed to regret her words. 

"Oh, yes, " she said hurriedly, "we've had a few. "

"But aren't you--wasn't your father afraid they'd talk outside?"

"Oh, to some extent, to some extent, " she answered, "Let's talk aboutsomething pleasanter. "

But John's curiosity was aroused. 

"Something pleasanter!" he demanded. "What's unpleasant about that?Weren't they nice girls?"

To his great surprise Kismine began to weep. 

"Yes--th--that's the--the whole t-trouble. I grew qu-quite attached tosome of them. So did Jasmine, but she kept inv-viting them anyway. Icouldn't under_stand_ it. "

A dark suspicion was born in John's heart. 

"Do you mean that they _told_, and your father hadthem--removed?"

"Worse than that, " she muttered brokenly. "Father took no chances--andJasmine kept writing them to come, and they had _such_ a goodtime!"

She was overcome by a paroxysm of grief. 

Stunned with the horror of this revelation, John sat thereopen-mouthed, feeling the nerves of his body twitter like so manysparrows perched upon his spinal column. 

"Now, I've told you, and I shouldn't have, " she said, calming suddenlyand drying her dark blue eyes. 

"Do you mean to say that your father had them _murdered_ beforethey left?"

She nodded. 

"In August usually--or early in September. It's only natural for us toget all the pleasure out of them that we can first. "

"How abominable! How--why, I must be going crazy! Did you really admitthat--"

"I did, " interrupted Kismine, shrugging her shoulders. "We can't verywell imprison them like those aviators, where they'd be a continualreproach to us every day. And it's always been made easier for Jasmineand me, because father had it done sooner than we expected. In thatway we avoided any farewell scene-"

"So you murdered them! Uh!" cried John. 

"It was done very nicely. They were drugged while they wereasleep--and their families were always told that they died of scarletfever in Butte. "

"But--I fail to understand why you kept on inviting them!"

"I didn't, " burst out Kismine. "I never invited one. Jasmine did. Andthey always had a very good time. She'd give them the nicest presentstoward the last. I shall probably have visitors too--I'll harden up toit. We can't let such an inevitable thing as death stand in the way ofenjoying life while we have it. Think of how lonesome it'd be out hereif we never had _any_ one. Why, father and mother have sacrificedsome of their best friends just as we have. "

"And so, " cried John accusingly, "and so you were letting me make loveto you and pretending to return it, and talking about marriage, allthe time knowing perfectly well that I'd never get out of herealive---"

"No, " she protested passionately. "Not any more. I did at first. Youwere here. I couldn't help that, and I thought your last days might aswell be pleasant for both of us. But then I fell in love with you, and--and I'm honestly sorry you're going to--going to be putaway--though I'd rather you'd be put away than ever kiss anothergirl. "

"Oh, you would, would you?" cried John ferociously. 

"Much rather. Besides, I've always heard that a girl can have more funwith a man whom she knows she can never marry. Oh, why did I tell you?I've probably spoiled your whole good time now, and we were reallyenjoying things when you didn't know it. I knew it would make thingssort of depressing for you. "

"Oh, you did, did you?" John's voice trembled with anger. "I've heardabout enough of this. If you haven't any more pride and decency thanto have an affair with a fellow that you know isn't much better than acorpse, I don't want to have any more to with you!"

"You're not a corpse!" she protested in horror. "You're not a corpse!I won't have you saying that I kissed a corpse!"

"I said nothing of the sort!"

"You did! You said I kissed a corpse!"

"I didn't!"

Their voices had risen, but upon a sudden interruption they bothsubsided into immediate silence. Footsteps were coming along the pathin their direction, and a moment later the rose bushes were parteddisplaying Braddock Washington, whose intelligent eyes set in hisgood-looking vacuous face were peering in at them. 

"Who kissed a corpse?" he demanded in obvious disapproval. 

"Nobody, " answered Kismine quickly. "We were just joking. "

"What are you two doing here, anyhow?" he demanded gruffly. "Kismine, you ought to be--to be reading or playing golf with your sister. Goread! Go play golf! Don't let me find you here when I come back!"

Then he bowed at John and went up the path. 

"See?" said Kismine crossly, when he was out of hearing. "You'vespoiled it all. We can never meet any more. He won't let me meet you. He'd have you poisoned if he thought we were in love. "

"We're not, any more!" cried John fiercely, "so he can set his mind atrest upon that. Moreover, don't fool yourself that I'm going to stayaround here. Inside of six hours I'll be over those mountains, if Ihave to gnaw a passage through them, and on my way East. " They hadboth got to their feet, and at this remark Kismine came close and puther arm through his. 

"I'm going, too. "

"You must be crazy--"

"Of course I'm going, " she interrupted impatiently. 

"You most certainly are not. You--"

"Very well, " she said quietly, "we'll catch up with father and talk itover with him. "

Defeated, John mustered a sickly smile. 

"Very well, dearest, " he agreed, with pale and unconvincing affection, "we'll go together. "

His love for her returned and settled placidly on his heart. She washis--she would go with him to share his dangers. He put his arms abouther and kissed her fervently. After all she loved him; she had savedhim, in fact. 

Discussing the matter, they walked slowly back toward the château. They decided that since Braddock Washington had seen them togetherthey had best depart the next night. Nevertheless, John's lips wereunusually dry at dinner, and he nervously emptied a great spoonful ofpeacock soup into his left lung. He had to be carried into theturquoise and sable card-room and pounded on the back by one of theunder-butlers, which Percy considered a great joke. 

9

Long after midnight John's body gave a nervous jerk, he sat suddenlyupright, staring into the veils of somnolence that draped the room. Through the squares of blue darkness that were his open windows, hehad heard a faint far-away sound that died upon a bed of wind beforeidentifying itself on his memory, clouded with uneasy dreams. But thesharp noise that had succeeded it was nearer, was just outside theroom--the click of a turned knob, a footstep, a whisper, he could nottell; a hard lump gathered in the pit of his stomach, and his wholebody ached in the moment that he strained agonisingly to hear. Thenone of the veils seemed to dissolve, and he saw a vague figurestanding by the door, a figure only faintly limned and blocked in uponthe darkness, mingled so with the folds of the drapery as to seemdistorted, like a reflection seen in a dirty pane of glass. 

With a sudden movement of fright or resolution John pressed the buttonby his bedside, and the next moment he was sitting in the green sunkenbath of the adjoining room, waked into alertness by the shock of thecold water which half filled it. 

He sprang out, and, his wet pyjamas scattering a heavy trickle ofwater behind him, ran for the aquamarine door which he knew led out onto the ivory landing of the second floor. The door opened noiselessly. A single crimson lamp burning in a great dome above lit themagnificent sweep of the carved stairways with a poignant beauty. Fora moment John hesitated, appalled by the silent splendour massed abouthim, seeming to envelop in its gigantic folds and contours thesolitary drenched little figure shivering upon the ivory landing. Thensimultaneously two things happened. The door of his own sitting-roomswung open, precipitating three naked negroes into the hall--and, asJohn swayed in wild terror toward the stairway, another door slid backin the wall on the other side of the corridor, and John saw BraddockWashington standing in the lighted lift, wearing a fur coat and a pairof riding boots which reached to his knees and displayed, above, theglow of his rose-colored pyjamas. 

On the instant the three negroes--John had never seen any of thembefore, and it flashed through his mind that they must be theprofessional executioners paused in their movement toward John, andturned expectantly to the man in the lift, who burst out with animperious command:

"Get in here! All three of you! Quick as hell!"

Then, within the instant, the three negroes darted into the cage, theoblong of light was blotted out as the lift door slid shut, and Johnwas again alone in the hall. He slumped weakly down against an ivorystair. 

It was apparent that something portentous had occurred, somethingwhich, for the moment at least, had postponed his own petty disaster. What was it? Had the negroes risen in revolt? Had the aviators forcedaside the iron bars of the grating? Or had the men of Fish stumbledblindly through the hills and gazed with bleak, joyless eyes upon thegaudy valley? John did not know. He heard a faint whir of air as thelift whizzed up again, and then, a moment later, as it descended. Itwas probable that Percy was hurrying to his father's assistance, andit occurred to John that this was his opportunity to join Kismine andplan an immediate escape. He waited until the lift had been silent forseveral minutes; shivering a little with the night cool that whippedin through his wet pyjamas, he returned to his room and dressedhimself quickly. Then he mounted a long flight of stairs and turneddown the corridor carpeted with Russian sable which led to Kismine'ssuite. 

The door of her sitting-room was open and the lamps were lighted. Kismine, in an angora kimono, stood near the window Of the room in alistening attitude, and as John entered noiselessly she turned towardhim. 

"Oh, it's you!" she whispered, crossing the room to him. "Did you hearthem?"

I heard your father's slaves in my---"

"No, " she interrupted excitedly. "Aeroplanes!"

"Aeroplanes? Perhaps that was the sound that woke me. "

"There're at least a dozen. I saw one a few moments ago dead againstthe moon. The guard back by the cliff fired his rifle and that's whatroused father. We're going to open on them right away. "

"Are they here on purpose?"

"Yes--it's that Italian who got away---"

Simultaneously with her last word, a succession of sharp crackstumbled in through the open window. Kismine uttered a little cry, tooka penny with fumbling fingers from a box on her dresser, and ran toone of the electric lights. In an instant the entire chateau was indarkness--she had blown out the fuse. 

"Come on!" she cried to him. "We'll go up to the roof garden, andwatch it from there!"

Drawing a cape about her, she took his hand, and they found their wayout the door. It was only a step to the tower lift, and as she pressedthe button that shot them upward he put his arms around her in thedarkness and kissed her mouth. Romance had come to John Unger at last. A minute later they had stepped out upon the star-white platform. Above, under the misty moon, sliding in and out of the patches ofcloud that eddied below it, floated a dozen dark-winged bodies in aconstant circling course. From here and there in the valley flashes offire leaped toward them, followed by sharp detonations. Kismineclapped her hands with pleasure, which, a moment later, turned todismay as the aeroplanes, at some prearranged signal, began to releasetheir bombs and the whole of the valley became a panorama of deepreverberate sound and lurid light. 

Before long the aim of the attackers became concentrated upon thepoints where the anti-aircraft guns were situated, and one of them wasalmost immediately reduced to a giant cinder to lie smouldering in apark of rose bushes. 

"Kismine, " begged John, "you'll be glad when I tell you that thisattack came on the eve of my murder. If I hadn't heard that guardshoot off his gun back by the pass I should now be stone dead---"

"I can't hear you!" cried Kismine, intent on the scene before her. "You'll have to talk louder!"

"I simply said, " shouted John, "that we'd better get out before theybegin to shell the chateau!"

Suddenly the whole portico of the negro quarters cracked asunder, ageyser of flame shot up from under the colonnades, and great fragmentsof jagged marble were hurled as far as the borders of the lake. 

"There go fifty thousand dollars' worth of slaves, " cried Kismine, "atpre-war prices. So few Americans have any respect for property. "

John renewed his efforts to compel her to leave. The aim of theaeroplanes was becoming more precise minute by minute, and only two ofthe anti-aircraft guns were still retaliating. It was obvious that thegarrison, encircled with fire, could not hold out much longer. 

"Come on!" cried John, pulling Kismine's arm, "we've got to go. Do yourealise that those aviators will kill you without question if theyfind you?"

She consented reluctantly. 

"We'll have to wake Jasmine!" she said, as they hurried toward thelift. Then she added in a sort of childish delight: "We'll be poor, won't we? Like people in books. And I'll be an orphan and utterlyfree. Free and poor! What fun!" She stopped and raised her lips to himin a delighted kiss. 

"It's impossible to be both together, " said John grimly. "People havefound that out. And I should choose to be free as preferable of thetwo. As an extra caution you'd better dump the contents of your jewelbox into your pockets. "

Ten minutes later the two girls met John in the dark corridor and theydescended to the main floor of the chateau. Passing for the last timethrough the magnificence of the splendid halls, they stood for amoment out on the terrace, watching the burning negro quarters and theflaming embers of two planes which had fallen on the other side of thelake. A solitary gun was still keeping up a sturdy popping, and theattackers seemed timorous about descending lower, but sent theirthunderous fireworks in a circle around it, until any chance shotmight annihilate its Ethiopian crew. 

John and the two sisters passed down the marble steps, turned sharplyto the left, and began to ascend a narrow path that wound like agarter about the diamond mountain. Kismine knew a heavily wooded spothalf-way up where they could lie concealed and yet be able to observethe wild night in the valley--finally to make an escape, when itshould be necessary, along a secret path laid in a rocky gully. 

10

It was three o'clock when they attained their destination. Theobliging and phlegmatic Jasmine fell off to sleep immediately, leaningagainst the trunk of a large tree, while John and Kismine sat, his armaround her, and watched the desperate ebb and flow of the dying battleamong the ruins of a vista that had been a garden spot that morning. Shortly after four o'clock the last remaining gun gave out a clangingsound, and went out of action in a swift tongue of red smoke. Thoughthe moon was down, they saw that the flying bodies were circlingcloser to the earth. When the planes had made certain that thebeleaguered possessed no further resources they would land and thedark and glittering reign of the Washingtons would be over. 

With the cessation of the firing the valley grew quiet. The embers ofthe two aeroplanes glowed like the eyes of some monster crouching inthe grass. The château stood dark and silent, beautiful without lightas it had been beautiful in the sun, while the woody rattles ofNemesis filled the air above with a growing and receding complaint. Then John perceived that Kismine, like her sister, had fallen soundasleep. 

It was long after four when he became aware of footsteps along thepath they had lately followed, and he waited in breathless silenceuntil the persons to whom they belonged had passed the vantage-pointhe occupied. There was a faint stir in the air now that was not ofhuman origin, and the dew was cold; be knew that the dawn would breaksoon. John waited until the steps had gone a safe distance up themountain and were inaudible. Then he followed. About half-way to thesteep summit the trees fell away and a hard saddle of rock spreaditself over the diamond beneath. Just before he reached this point heslowed down his pace warned by an animal sense that there was lifejust ahead of him. Coming to a high boulder, he lifted his headgradually above its edge. His curiosity was rewarded; this is what hesaw:

Braddock Washington was standing there motionless, silhouetted againstthe gray sky without sound or sign of life. As the dawn came up out ofthe east, lending a gold green colour to the earth, it brought thesolitary figure into insignificant contrast with the new day, While John watched, his host remained for a few moments absorbed insome inscrutable contemplation; then he signalled to the two negroeswho crouched at his feet to lift the burden which lay between them. Asthey struggled upright, the first yellow beam of the sun struckthrough the innumerable prisms of an immense and exquisitely chiselleddiamond--and a white radiance was kindled that glowed upon the airlike a fragment of the morning star. The bearers staggered beneath itsweight for a moment--then their rippling muscles caught and hardenedunder the wet shine of the skins and the three figures were againmotionless in their defiant impotency before the heavens. 

After a while the white man lifted his head and slowly raised his armsin a gesture of attention, as one who would call a great crowd tohear--but there was no crowd, only the vast silence of the mountainand the sky, broken by faint bird voices down among the trees. Thefigure on the saddle of rock began to speak ponderously and with aninextinguishable pride. 

"You--out there---!" he cried in a trembling voice. 

"You--there-----!" He paused, his arms still uplifted, his head heldattentively as though he were expecting an answer. John strained hiseyes to see whether there might be men coming down the mountain, butthe mountain was bare of human life. There was only sky and a mockingflute of wind along the treetops. Could Washington be praying? For amoment John wondered. Then the illusion passed--there was something inthe man's whole attitude antithetical to prayer. 

"Oh, you above there!"

The voice was become strong and confident. This was no forlornsupplication. If anything, there was in it a quality of monstrouscondescension. 

"You there---" Words, too quickly uttered to be understood, flowingone into the other . . . . John listened breathlessly, catching a phrasehere and there, while the voice broke off, resumed, broke offagain--now strong and argumentative, now coloured with a slow, puzzledimpatience, Then a conviction commenced to dawn on the singlelistener, and as realisation crept over him a spray of quick bloodrushed through his arteries. Braddock Washington was offering a bribeto God!

That was it--there was no doubt. The diamond in the arms of his slaveswas some advance sample, a promise of more to follow. 

That, John perceived after a time, was the thread running through hissentences. Prometheus Enriched was calling to witness forgottensacrifices, forgotten rituals, prayers obsolete before the birth ofChrist. For a while his discourse took the farm of reminding God ofthis gift or that which Divinity had deigned to accept from men--greatchurches if he would rescue cities from the plague, gifts of myrrh andgold, of human lives and beautiful women and captive armies, ofchildren and queens, of beasts of the forest and field, sheep andgoats, harvests and cities, whole conquered lands that had beenoffered up in lust or blood for His appeasal, buying a meed's worth ofalleviation from the Divine wrath--and now he, Braddock Washington, Emperor of Diamonds, king and priest of the age of gold, arbiter ofsplendour and luxury, would offer up a treasure such as princes beforehim had never dreamed of, offer it up not in suppliance, but in pride. 

He would give to God, he continued, getting down to specifications, the greatest diamond in the world. This diamond would be cut with manymore thousand facets than there were leaves on a tree, and yet thewhole diamond would be shaped with the perfection of a stone no biggerthan a fly. Many men would work upon it for many years. It would beset in a great dome of beaten gold, wonderfully carved and equippedwith gates of opal and crusted sapphire. In the middle would behollowed out a chapel presided over by an altar of iridescent, decomposing, ever-changing radium which would burn out the eyes of anyworshipper who lifted up his head from prayer--and on this altar therewould be slain for the amusement of the Divine Benefactor any victimHe should choose, even though it should be the greatest and mostpowerful man alive. 

In return he asked only a simple thing, a thing that for God would beabsurdly easy--only that matters should be as they were yesterday atthis hour and that they should so remain. So very simple! Let but theheavens open, swallowing these men and their aeroplanes--and thenclose again. Let him have his slaves once more, restored to life andwell. 

There was no one else with whom he had ever needed: to treat orbargain. 

He doubted only whether he had made his bribe big enough. God had Hisprice, of course. God was made in man's image, so it had been said: Hemust have His price. And the price would be rare--no cathedral whosebuilding consumed many years, no pyramid constructed by ten thousandworkmen, would be like this cathedral, this pyramid. 

He paused here. That was his proposition. Everything would be up tospecifications, and there was nothing vulgar in his assertion that itwould be cheap at the price. He implied that Providence could take itor leave it. 

As he approached the end his sentences became broken, became short anduncertain, and his body seemed tense, seemed strained to catch theslightest pressure or whisper of life in the spaces around him. Hishair had turned gradually white as he talked, and now he lifted hishead high to the heavens like a prophet of old--magnificently mad. 

Then, as John stared in giddy fascination, it seemed to him that acurious phenomenon took place somewhere around him. It was as thoughthe sky had darkened for an instant, as though there had been a suddenmurmur in a gust of wind, a sound of far-away trumpets, a sighing likethe rustle of a great silken robe--for a time the whole of natureround about partook of this darkness; the birds' song ceased; thetrees were still, and far over the mountain there was a mutter ofdull, menacing thunder. 

That was all. The wind died along the tall grasses of the valley. Thedawn and the day resumed their place in a time, and the risen sun senthot waves of yellow mist that made its path bright before it. Theleaves laughed in the sun, and their laughter shook until each boughwas like a girl's school in fairyland. God had refused to accept thebribe. 

For another moment John, watched the triumph of the day. Then, turning, he saw a flutter of brown down by the lake, then anotherflutter, then another, like the dance of golden angels alighting fromthe clouds. The aeroplanes had come to earth. 

John slid off the boulder and ran down the side of the mountain to theclump of trees, where the two girls were awake and waiting for him. Kismine sprang to her feet, the jewels in her pockets jingling, aquestion on her parted lips, but instinct told John that there was notime for words. They must get off the mountain without losing amoment. He seized a hand of each, and in silence they threaded thetree-trunks, washed with light now and with the rising mist. Behindthem from the valley came no sound at all, except the complaint of thepeacocks far away and the pleasant of morning. 

When they had gone about half a mile, they avoided the park land andentered a narrow path that led over the next rise of ground. At thehighest point of this they paused and turned around. Their eyes restedupon the mountainside they had just left--oppressed by some dark senseof tragic impendency. 

Clear against the sky a broken, white-haired man was slowly descendingthe steep slope, followed by two gigantic and emotionless negroes, whocarried a burden between them which still flashed and glittered in thesun. Half-way down two other figures joined them--John could see thatthey were Mrs. Washington and her son, upon whose arm she leaned. Theaviators had clambered from their machines to the sweeping lawn infront of the chateau, and with rifles in hand were starting up thediamond mountain in skirmishing formation. 

But the little group of five which had formed farther up and wasengrossing all the watchers' attention had stopped upon a ledge ofrock. The negroes stooped and pulled up what appeared to be atrap-door in the side of the mountain. Into this they all disappeared, the white-haired man first, then his wife and son, finally the twonegroes, the glittering tips of whose jewelled head-dresses caught thesun for a moment before the trap-door descended and engulfed them all. 

Kismine clutched John's arm. 

"Oh, " she cried wildly, "where are they going? What are they going todo?"

"It must be some underground way of escape--"

A little scream from the two girls interrupted his sentence. 

"Don't you see?" sobbed Kismine hysterically. "The mountain is wired!"

Even as she spoke John put up his hands to shield his sight. Beforetheir eyes the whole surface of the mountain had changed suddenly to adazzling burning yellow, which showed up through the jacket of turf aslight shows through a human hand. For a moment the intolerable glowcontinued, and then like an extinguished filament it disappeared, revealing a black waste from which blue smoke arose slowly, carryingoff with it what remained of vegetation and of human flesh. Of theaviators there was left neither blood nor bone--they were consumed ascompletely as the five souls who had gone inside. 

Simultaneously, and with an immense concussion, the château literallythrew itself into the air, bursting into flaming fragments as it rose, and then tumbling back upon itself in a smoking pile that layprojecting half into the water of the lake. There was no fire--whatsmoke there was drifted off mingling with the sunshine, and for a fewminutes longer a powdery dust of marble drifted from the greatfeatureless pile that had once been the house of jewels. There was nomore sound and the three people were alone in the valley. 

9

At sunset John and his two companions reached the huge cliff which hadmarked the boundaries of the Washington's dominion, and looking backfound the valley tranquil and lovely in the dusk. They sat down tofinish the food which Jasmine had brought with her in a basket, "There!" she said, as she spread the table-cloth and put thesandwiches in a neat pile upon it. "Don't they look tempting? I alwaysthink that food tastes better outdoors. "

"With that remark, " remarked Kismine, "Jasmine enters the middleclass. "

"Now, " said John eagerly, "turn out your pocket and let's see whatjewels you brought along. If you made a good selection we three oughtto live comfortably all the rest of our lives. "

Obediently Kismine put her hand in her pocket and tossed two handfulsof glittering stones before him. "Not so bad, " cried Johnenthusiastically. "They aren't very big, but-Hallo!" His expressionchanged as he held one of them up to the declining sun. "Why, thesearen't diamonds! There's something the matter!

"By golly!" exclaimed Kismine, with a startled look. "What an idiot Iam!"

"Why, these are rhinestones!" cried John. 

"I know. " She broke into a laugh. "I opened the wrong drawer. Theybelonged on the dress of a girl who visited Jasmine. I got her to givethem to me in exchange for diamonds. I'd never seen anything butprecious stones before. "

"And this is what you brought?"

"I'm afraid so. " She fingered the brilliants wistfully. "I think Ilike these better. I'm a little tired of diamonds. "

"Very well, " said John gloomily. "We'll have to live in Hades. And youwill grow old telling incredulous women that you got the wrong drawer. Unfortunately, your father's bank-books were consumed with him. "

"Well, what's the matter with Hades?"

"If I come home with a wife at my age my father is just as liable asnot to cut me off with a hot coal, as they say down there. "

Jasmine spoke up. 

"I love washing, " she said quietly. "I have always washed my ownhandkerchiefs. I'll take in laundry and support you both. "

"Do they have washwomen in Hades?" asked Kismine innocently. 

"Of course, " answered John. "It's just like anywhere else. "

"I thought--perhaps it was too hot to wear any clothes. "

John laughed. 

"Just try it!" he suggested. "They'll run you out before you're halfstarted. "

"Will father be there?" she asked. 

John turned to her in astonishment. 

"Your father is dead, " he replied sombrely. "Why should he go toHades? You have it confused with another place that was abolished longago. "

After supper they folded up the table-cloth and spread their blanketsfor the night. 

"What a dream it was, " Kismine sighed, gazing up at the stars. "Howstrange it seems to be here with one dress and a penniless fiancée!

"Under the stars, " she repeated. "I never noticed the stars before. Ialways thought of them as great big diamonds that belonged to someone. Now they frighten me. They make me feel that it was all a dream, all my youth. "

"It _was_ a dream, " said John quietly. "Everybody's youth is adream, a form of chemical madness. "

"How pleasant then to be insane!"

"So I'm told, " said John gloomily. "I don't know any longer. At anyrate, let us love for a while, for a year or so, you and me. That's aform of divine drunkenness that we can all try. There are onlydiamonds in the whole world, diamonds and perhaps the shabby gift ofdisillusion. Well, I have that last and I will make the usual nothingof it. " He shivered. "Turn up your coat collar, little girl, thenight's full of chill and you'll get pneumonia. His was a great sinwho first invented consciousness. Let us lose it for a few hours. "

So wrapping himself in his blanket he fell off to sleep. 

THE CURIOUS CASE OF BENJAMIN BUTTON

I

As long ago as 1860 it was the proper thing to be born at home. Atpresent, so I am told, the high gods of medicine have decreed that thefirst cries of the young shall be uttered upon the anaesthetic air ofa hospital, preferably a fashionable one. So young Mr. And Mrs. RogerButton were fifty years ahead of style when they decided, one day inthe summer of 1860, that their first baby should be born in ahospital. Whether this anachronism had any bearing upon theastonishing history I am about to set down will never be known. 

I shall tell you what occurred, and let you judge for yourself. 

The Roger Buttons held an enviable position, both social andfinancial, in ante-bellum Baltimore. They were related to the ThisFamily and the That Family, which, as every Southerner knew, entitledthem to membership in that enormous peerage which largely populatedthe Confederacy. This was their first experience with the charming oldcustom of having babies--Mr. Button was naturally nervous. He hoped itwould be a boy so that he could be sent to Yale College inConnecticut, at which institution Mr. Button himself had been knownfor four years by the somewhat obvious nickname of "Cuff. "

On the September morning consecrated to the enormous event he arosenervously at six o'clock dressed himself, adjusted an impeccablestock, and hurried forth through the streets of Baltimore to thehospital, to determine whether the darkness of the night had borne innew life upon its bosom. 

When he was approximately a hundred yards from the Maryland PrivateHospital for Ladies and Gentlemen he saw Doctor Keene, the familyphysician, descending the front steps, rubbing his hands together witha washing movement--as all doctors are required to do by the unwrittenethics of their profession. 

Mr. Roger Button, the president of Roger Button & Co. , WholesaleHardware, began to run toward Doctor Keene with much less dignity thanwas expected from a Southern gentleman of that picturesque period. "Doctor Keene!" he called. "Oh, Doctor Keene!"

The doctor heard him, faced around, and stood waiting, a curiousexpression settling on his harsh, medicinal face as Mr. Button drewnear. 

"What happened?" demanded Mr. Button, as he came up in a gasping rush. "What was it? How is she" A boy? Who is it? What---"

"Talk sense!" said Doctor Keene sharply, He appeared somewhatirritated. 

"Is the child born?" begged Mr. Button. 

Doctor Keene frowned. "Why, yes, I suppose so--after a fashion. " Againhe threw a curious glance at Mr. Button. 

"Is my wife all right?"

"Yes. "

"Is it a boy or a girl?"

"Here now!" cried Doctor Keene in a perfect passion of irritation, "I'll ask you to go and see for yourself. Outrageous!" He snapped thelast word out in almost one syllable, then he turned away muttering:"Do you imagine a case like this will help my professional reputation?One more would ruin me--ruin anybody. "

"What's the matter?" demanded Mr. Button appalled. "Triplets?"

"No, not triplets!" answered the doctor cuttingly. "What's more, youcan go and see for yourself. And get another doctor. I brought youinto the world, young man, and I've been physician to your family forforty years, but I'm through with you! I don't want to see you or anyof your relatives ever again! Good-bye!"

Then he turned sharply, and without another word climbed into hisphaeton, which was waiting at the curbstone, and drove severely away. 

Mr. Button stood there upon the sidewalk, stupefied and trembling fromhead to foot. What horrible mishap had occurred? He had suddenly lostall desire to go into the Maryland Private Hospital for Ladies andGentlemen--it was with the greatest difficulty that, a moment later, he forced himself to mount the steps and enter the front door. 

A nurse was sitting behind a desk in the opaque gloom of the hall. Swallowing his shame, Mr. Button approached her. 

"Good-morning, " she remarked, looking up at him pleasantly. 

"Good-morning. I--I am Mr. Button. "

At this a look of utter terror spread itself over girl's face. Sherose to her feet and seemed about to fly from the hall, restrainingherself only with the most apparent difficulty. 

"I want to see my child, " said Mr. Button. 

The nurse gave a little scream. "Oh--of course!" she criedhysterically. "Upstairs. Right upstairs. Go--_up!_"

She pointed the direction, and Mr. Button, bathed in coolperspiration, turned falteringly, and began to mount to the secondfloor. In the upper hall he addressed another nurse who approachedhim, basin in hand. "I'm Mr. Button, " he managed to articulate. "Iwant to see my----"

Clank! The basin clattered to the floor and rolled in the direction ofthe stairs. Clank! Clank! I began a methodical decent as if sharing inthe general terror which this gentleman provoked. 

"I want to see my child!" Mr. Button almost shrieked. He was on theverge of collapse. 

Clank! The basin reached the first floor. The nurse regained controlof herself, and threw Mr. Button a look of hearty contempt. 

"All _right_, Mr. Button, " she agreed in a hushed voice. "Very_well!_ But if you _knew_ what a state it's put us all in thismorning! It's perfectly outrageous! The hospital will never havea ghost of a reputation after----"

"Hurry!" he cried hoarsely. "I can't stand this!"

"Come this way, then, Mr. Button. "

He dragged himself after her. At the end of a long hall they reached aroom from which proceeded a variety of howls--indeed, a room which, inlater parlance, would have been known as the "crying-room. " Theyentered. 

"Well, " gasped Mr. Button, "which is mine?"

"There!" said the nurse. 

Mr. Button's eyes followed her pointing finger, and this is what hesaw. Wrapped in a voluminous white blanket, and partly crammed intoone of the cribs, there sat an old man apparently about seventy yearsof age. His sparse hair was almost white, and from his chin dripped along smoke-coloured beard, which waved absurdly back and forth, fannedby the breeze coming in at the window. He looked up at Mr. Button withdim, faded eyes in which lurked a puzzled question. 

"Am I mad?" thundered Mr. Button, his terror resolving into rage. "Isthis some ghastly hospital joke?

"It doesn't seem like a joke to us, " replied the nurse severely. "AndI don't know whether you're mad or not--but that is most certainlyyour child. "

The cool perspiration redoubled on Mr. Button's forehead. He closedhis eyes, and then, opening them, looked again. There was nomistake--he was gazing at a man of threescore and ten--a _baby_of threescore and ten, a baby whose feet hung over the sides of thecrib in which it was reposing. 

The old man looked placidly from one to the other for a moment, andthen suddenly spoke in a cracked and ancient voice. "Are you myfather?" he demanded. 

Mr. Button and the nurse started violently. 

"Because if you are, " went on the old man querulously, "I wish you'dget me out of this place--or, at least, get them to put a comfortablerocker in here, "

"Where in God's name did you come from? Who are you?" burst out Mr. Button frantically. 

"I can't tell you _exactly_ who I am, " replied the querulouswhine, "because I've only been born a few hours--but my last name iscertainly Button. "

"You lie! You're an impostor!"

The old man turned wearily to the nurse. "Nice way to welcome anew-born child, " he complained in a weak voice. "Tell him he's wrong, why don't you?"

"You're wrong. Mr. Button, " said the nurse severely. "This is yourchild, and you'll have to make the best of it. We're going to ask youto take him home with you as soon as possible-some time to-day. "

"Home?" repeated Mr. Button incredulously. 

"Yes, we can't have him here. We really can't, you know?"

"I'm right glad of it, " whined the old man. "This is a fine place tokeep a youngster of quiet tastes. With all this yelling and howling, Ihaven't been able to get a wink of sleep. I asked for something toeat"--here his voice rose to a shrill note of protest--"and theybrought me a bottle of milk!"

Mr. Button, sank down upon a chair near his son and concealed his facein his hands. "My heavens!" he murmured, in an ecstasy of horror. "What will people say? What must I do?"

"You'll have to take him home, " insisted the nurse--"immediately!"

A grotesque picture formed itself with dreadful clarity before theeyes of the tortured man--a picture of himself walking through thecrowded streets of the city with this appalling apparition stalking byhis side. 

"I can't. I can't, " he moaned. 

People would stop to speak to him, and what was he going to say? Hewould have to introduce this--this septuagenarian: "This is my son, born early this morning. " And then the old man would gather hisblanket around him and they would plod on, past the bustling stores, the slave market--for a dark instant Mr. Button wished passionatelythat his son was black--past the luxurious houses of the residentialdistrict, past the home for the aged. . . . 

"Come! Pull yourself together, " commanded the nurse. 

"See here, " the old man announced suddenly, "if you think I'm going towalk home in this blanket, you're entirely mistaken. "

"Babies always have blankets. "

With a malicious crackle the old man held up a small white swaddlinggarment. "Look!" he quavered. "_This_ is what they had ready forme. "

"Babies always wear those, " said the nurse primly. 

"Well, " said the old man, "this baby's not going to wear anything inabout two minutes. This blanket itches. They might at least have givenme a sheet. "

"Keep it on! Keep it on!" said Mr. Button hurriedly. He turned to thenurse. "What'll I do?"

"Go down town and buy your son some clothes. "

Mr. Button's son's voice followed him down into the: hall: "And acane, father. I want to have a cane. "

Mr. Button banged the outer door savagely. . . . 

2

"Good-morning, " Mr. Button said nervously, to the clerk in theChesapeake Dry Goods Company. "I want to buy some clothes for mychild. "

"How old is your child, sir?"

"About six hours, " answered Mr. Button, without due consideration. 

"Babies' supply department in the rear. "

"Why, I don't think--I'm not sure that's what I want. It's--he's anunusually large-size child. Exceptionally--ah large. "

"They have the largest child's sizes. "

"Where is the boys' department?" inquired Mr. Button, shifting hisground desperately. He felt that the clerk must surely scent hisshameful secret. 

"Right here. "

"Well----" He hesitated. The notion of dressing his son in men'sclothes was repugnant to him. If, say, he could only find a very largeboy's suit, he might cut off that long and awful beard, dye the whitehair brown, and thus manage to conceal the worst, and to retainsomething of his own self-respect--not to mention his position inBaltimore society. 

But a frantic inspection of the boys' department revealed no suits tofit the new-born Button. He blamed the store, of course---in suchcases it is the thing to blame the store. 

"How old did you say that boy of yours was?" demanded the clerkcuriously. 

"He's--sixteen. "

"Oh, I beg your pardon. I thought you said six _hours_. You'llfind the youths' department in the next aisle. "

Mr. Button turned miserably away. Then he stopped, brightened, andpointed his finger toward a dressed dummy in the window display. "There!" he exclaimed. "I'll take that suit, out there on the dummy. "

The clerk stared. "Why, " he protested, "that's not a child's suit. Atleast it _is_, but it's for fancy dress. You could wear ityourself!"

"Wrap it up, " insisted his customer nervously. "That's what I want. "

The astonished clerk obeyed. 

Back at the hospital Mr. Button entered the nursery and almost threwthe package at his son. "Here's your clothes, " he snapped out. 

The old man untied the package and viewed the contents with aquizzical eye. 

"They look sort of funny to me, " he complained, "I don't want to bemade a monkey of--"

"You've made a monkey of me!" retorted Mr. Button fiercely. "Never youmind how funny you look. Put them on--or I'll--or I'll _spank_you. " He swallowed uneasily at the penultimate word, feelingnevertheless that it was the proper thing to say. 

"All right, father"--this with a grotesque simulation of filialrespect--"you've lived longer; you know best. Just as you say. "

As before, the sound of the word "father" caused Mr. Button to startviolently. 

"And hurry. "

"I'm hurrying, father. "

When his son was dressed Mr. Button regarded him with depression. Thecostume consisted of dotted socks, pink pants, and a belted blousewith a wide white collar. Over the latter waved the long whitishbeard, drooping almost to the waist. The effect was not good. 

"Wait!"

Mr. Button seized a hospital shears and with three quick snapsamputated a large section of the beard. But even with this improvementthe ensemble fell far short of perfection. The remaining brush ofscraggly hair, the watery eyes, the ancient teeth, seemed oddly out oftone with the gaiety of the costume. Mr. Button, however, wasobdurate--he held out his hand. "Come along!" he said sternly. 

His son took the hand trustingly. "What are you going to call me, dad?" he quavered as they walked from the nursery--"just 'baby' for awhile? till you think of a better name?"

Mr. Button grunted. "I don't know, " he answered harshly. "I thinkwe'll call you Methuselah. "

3

Even after the new addition to the Button family had had his hair cutshort and then dyed to a sparse unnatural black, had had his faceshaved so dose that it glistened, and had been attired in small-boyclothes made to order by a flabbergasted tailor, it was impossible forButton to ignore the fact that his son was a excuse for a first familybaby. Despite his aged stoop, Benjamin Button--for it was by this namethey called him instead of by the appropriate but invidiousMethuselah--was five feet eight inches tall. His clothes did notconceal this, nor did the clipping and dyeing of his eyebrows disguisethe fact that the eyes under--were faded and watery and tired. Infact, the baby-nurse who had been engaged in advance left the houseafter one look, in a state of considerable indignation. 

But Mr. Button persisted in his unwavering purpose. Benjamin was ababy, and a baby he should remain. At first he declared that ifBenjamin didn't like warm milk he could go without food altogether, but he was finally prevailed upon to allow his son bread and butter, and even oatmeal by way of a compromise. One day he brought home arattle and, giving it to Benjamin, insisted in no uncertain terms thathe should "play with it, " whereupon the old man took it with--a wearyexpression and could be heard jingling it obediently at intervalsthroughout the day. 

There can be no doubt, though, that the rattle bored him, and that hefound other and more soothing amusements when he was left alone. Forinstance, Mr. Button discovered one day that during the preceding weekbe had smoked more cigars than ever before--a phenomenon, which wasexplained a few days later when, entering the nursery unexpectedly, hefound the room full of faint blue haze and Benjamin, with a guiltyexpression on his face, trying to conceal the butt of a dark Havana. This, of course, called for a severe spanking, but Mr. Button foundthat he could not bring himself to administer it. He merely warned hisson that he would "stunt his growth. "

Nevertheless he persisted in his attitude. He brought home leadsoldiers, he brought toy trains, he brought large pleasant animalsmade of cotton, and, to perfect the illusion which he wascreating--for himself at least--he passionately demanded of the clerkin the toy-store whether "the paint would come oft the pink duck ifthe baby put it in his mouth. " But, despite all his father's efforts, Benjamin refused to be interested. He would steal down the back stairsand return to the nursery with a volume of the EncyclopediaBritannica, over which he would pore through an afternoon, while hiscotton cows and his Noah's ark were left neglected on the floor. Against such a stubbornness Mr. Button's efforts were of little avail. 

The sensation created in Baltimore was, at first, prodigious. What themishap would have cost the Buttons and their kinsfolk socially cannotbe determined, for the outbreak of the Civil War drew the city'sattention to other things. A few people who were unfailingly politeracked their brains for compliments to give to the parents--andfinally hit upon the ingenious device of declaring that the babyresembled his grandfather, a fact which, due to the standard state ofdecay common to all men of seventy, could not be denied. Mr. And Mrs. Roger Button were not pleased, and Benjamin's grandfather wasfuriously insulted. 

Benjamin, once he left the hospital, took life as he found it. Severalsmall boys were brought to see him, and he spent a stiff-jointedafternoon trying to work up an interest in tops and marbles--he evenmanaged, quite accidentally, to break a kitchen window with a stonefrom a sling shot, a feat which secretly delighted his father. 

Thereafter Benjamin contrived to break something every day, but he didthese things only because they were expected of him, and because hewas by nature obliging. 

When his grandfather's initial antagonism wore off, Benjamin and thatgentleman took enormous pleasure in one another's company. They wouldsit for hours, these two, so far apart in age and experience, and, like old cronies, discuss with tireless monotony the slow events ofthe day. Benjamin felt more at ease in his grandfather's presence thanin his parents'--they seemed always somewhat in awe of him and, despite the dictatorial authority they exercised over him, frequentlyaddressed him as "Mr. "

He was as puzzled as any one else at the apparently advanced age ofhis mind and body at birth. He read up on it in the medical journal, but found that no such case had been previously recorded. At hisfather's urging he made an honest attempt to play with other boys, andfrequently he joined in the milder games--football shook him up toomuch, and he feared that in case of a fracture his ancient bones wouldrefuse to knit. 

When he was five he was sent to kindergarten, where he initiated intothe art of pasting green paper on orange paper, of weaving colouredmaps and manufacturing eternal cardboard necklaces. He was inclined todrowse off to sleep in the middle of these tasks, a habit which bothirritated and frightened his young teacher. To his relief shecomplained to his parents, and he was removed from the school. TheRoger Buttons told their friends that they felt he was too young. 

By the time he was twelve years old his parents had grown used to him. Indeed, so strong is the force of custom that they no longer felt thathe was different from any other child--except when some curiousanomaly reminded them of the fact. But one day a few weeks after histwelfth birthday, while looking in the mirror, Benjamin made, orthought he made, an astonishing discovery. Did his eyes deceive him, or had his hair turned in the dozen years of his life from white toiron-gray under its concealing dye? Was the network of wrinkles on hisface becoming less pronounced? Was his skin healthier and firmer, witheven a touch of ruddy winter colour? He could not tell. He knew thathe no longer stooped, and that his physical condition had improvedsince the early days of his life. 

"Can it be----?" he thought to himself, or, rather, scarcely dared tothink. 

He went to his father. "I am grown, " he announced determinedly. "Iwant to put on long trousers. "

His father hesitated. "Well, " he said finally, "I don't know. Fourteenis the age for putting on long trousers--and you are only twelve. "

"But you'll have to admit, " protested Benjamin, "that I'm big for myage. "

His father looked at him with illusory speculation. "Oh, I'm not sosure of that, " he said. "I was as big as you when I was twelve. "

This was not true-it was all part of Roger Button's silent agreementwith himself to believe in his son's normality. 

Finally a compromise was reached. Benjamin was to continue to dye hishair. He was to make a better attempt to play with boys of his ownage. He was not to wear his spectacles or carry a cane in the street. In return for these concessions he was allowed his first suit of longtrousers. . . . 

4

Of the life of Benjamin Button between his twelfth and twenty-firstyear I intend to say little. Suffice to record that they were years ofnormal ungrowth. When Benjamin was eighteen he was erect as a man offifty; he had more hair and it was of a dark gray; his step was firm, his voice had lost its cracked quaver and descended to a healthybaritone. So his father sent him up to Connecticut to takeexaminations for entrance to Yale College. Benjamin passed hisexamination and became a member of the freshman class. 

On the third day following his matriculation he received anotification from Mr. Hart, the college registrar, to call at hisoffice and arrange his schedule. Benjamin, glancing in the mirror, decided that his hair needed a new application of its brown dye, butan anxious inspection of his bureau drawer disclosed that the dyebottle was not there. Then he remembered--he had emptied it the daybefore and thrown it away. 

He was in a dilemma. He was due at the registrar's in five minutes. There seemed to be no help for it--he must go as he was. He did. 

"Good-morning, " said the registrar politely. "You've come to inquireabout your son. "

"Why, as a matter of fact, my name's Button----" began Benjamin, butMr. Hart cut him off. 

"I'm very glad to meet you, Mr. Button. I'm expecting your son hereany minute. "

"That's me!" burst out Benjamin. "I'm a freshman. "

"What!"

"I'm a freshman. "

"Surely you're joking. "

"Not at all. "

The registrar frowned and glanced at a card before him. "Why, I haveMr. Benjamin Button's age down here as eighteen. "

"That's my age, " asserted Benjamin, flushing slightly. 

The registrar eyed him wearily. "Now surely, Mr. Button, you don'texpect me to believe that. "

Benjamin smiled wearily. "I am eighteen, " he repeated. 

The registrar pointed sternly to the door. "Get out, " he said. "Getout of college and get out of town. You are a dangerous lunatic. "

"I am eighteen. "

Mr. Hart opened the door. "The idea!" he shouted. "A man of your agetrying to enter here as a freshman. Eighteen years old, are you? Well, I'll give you eighteen minutes to get out of town. "

Benjamin Button walked with dignity from the room, and half a dozenundergraduates, who were waiting in the hall, followed him curiouslywith their eyes. When he had gone a little way he turned around, facedthe infuriated registrar, who was still standing in the door-way, andrepeated in a firm voice: "I am eighteen years old. "

To a chorus of titters which went up from the group of undergraduates, Benjamin walked away. 

But he was not fated to escape so easily. On his melancholy walk tothe railroad station he found that he was being followed by a group, then by a swarm, and finally by a dense mass of undergraduates. Theword had gone around that a lunatic had passed the entranceexaminations for Yale and attempted to palm himself off as a youth ofeighteen. A fever of excitement permeated the college. Men ran hatlessout of classes, the football team abandoned its practice and joinedthe mob, professors' wives with bonnets awry and bustles out ofposition, ran shouting after the procession, from which proceeded acontinual succession of remarks aimed at the tender sensibilities ofBenjamin Button. 

"He must be the wandering Jew!"

"He ought to go to prep school at his age!"

"Look at the infant prodigy!" "He thought this was the old men'shome. "

"Go up to Harvard!"

Benjamin increased his gait, and soon he was running. He would showthem! He _would_ go to Harvard, and then they would regret theseill-considered taunts!

Safely on board the train for Baltimore, he put his head from thewindow. "You'll regret this!" he shouted. 

"Ha-ha!" the undergraduates laughed. "Ha-ha-ha!" It was the biggestmistake that Yale College had ever made. . . . 

5

In 1880 Benjamin Button was twenty years old, and he signalised hisbirthday by going to work for his father in Roger Button & Co. , Wholesale Hardware. It was in that same year that he began "going outsocially"--that is, his father insisted on taking him to severalfashionable dances. Roger Button was now fifty, and he and his sonwere more and more companionable--in fact, since Benjamin had ceasedto dye his hair (which was still grayish) they appeared about the sameage, and could have passed for brothers. 

One night in August they got into the phaeton attired in theirfull-dress suits and drove out to a dance at the Shevlins' countryhouse, situated just outside of Baltimore. It was a gorgeous evening. A full moon drenched the road to the lustreless colour of platinum, and late-blooming harvest flowers breathed into the motionless airaromas that were like low, half-heard laughter. The open country, carpeted for rods around with bright wheat, was translucent as in theday. It was almost impossible not to be affected by the sheer beautyof the sky--almost. 

"There's a great future in the dry-goods business, " Roger Button wassaying. He was not a spiritual man--his aesthetic sense wasrudimentary. 

"Old fellows like me can't learn new tricks, " he observed profoundly. "It's you youngsters with energy and vitality that have the greatfuture before you. "

Far up the road the lights of the Shevlins' country house drifted intoview, and presently there was a sighing sound that crept persistentlytoward them--it might have been the fine plaint of violins or therustle of the silver wheat under the moon. 

They pulled up behind a handsome brougham whose passengers weredisembarking at the door. A lady got out, then an elderly gentleman, then another young lady, beautiful as sin. Benjamin started; an almostchemical change seemed to dissolve and recompose the very elements ofhis body. A rigour passed over him, blood rose into his cheeks, hisforehead, and there was a steady thumping in his ears. It was firstlove. 

The girl was slender and frail, with hair that was ashen under themoon and honey-coloured under the sputtering gas-lamps of the porch. Over her shoulders was thrown a Spanish mantilla of softest yellow, butterflied in black; her feet were glittering buttons at the hem ofher bustled dress. 

Roger Button leaned over to his son. "That, " he said, "is youngHildegarde Moncrief, the daughter of General Moncrief. "

Benjamin nodded coldly. "Pretty little thing, " he said indifferently. But when the negro boy had led the buggy away, he added: "Dad, youmight introduce me to her. "

They approached a group, of which Miss Moncrief was the centre. Rearedin the old tradition, she curtsied low before Benjamin. Yes, he mighthave a dance. He thanked her and walked away--staggered away. 

The interval until the time for his turn should arrive dragged itselfout interminably. He stood close to the wall, silent, inscrutable, watching with murderous eyes the young bloods of Baltimore as theyeddied around Hildegarde Moncrief, passionate admiration in theirfaces. How obnoxious they seemed to Benjamin; how intolerably rosy!Their curling brown whiskers aroused in him a feeling equivalent toindigestion. 

But when his own time came, and he drifted with her out upon thechanging floor to the music of the latest waltz from Paris, hisjealousies and anxieties melted from him like a mantle of snow. Blindwith enchantment, he felt that life was just beginning. 

"You and your brother got here just as we did, didn't you?" askedHildegarde, looking up at him with eyes that were like bright blueenamel. 

Benjamin hesitated. If she took him for his father's brother, would itbe best to enlighten her? He remembered his experience at Yale, so hedecided against it. It would be rude to contradict a lady; it would becriminal to mar this exquisite occasion with the grotesque story ofhis origin. Later, perhaps. So he nodded, smiled, listened, was happy. 

"I like men of your age, " Hildegarde told him. "Young boys are soidiotic. They tell me how much champagne they drink at college, andhow much money they lose playing cards. Men of your age know how toappreciate women. "

Benjamin felt himself on the verge of a proposal--with an effort hechoked back the impulse. "You're just the romantic age, " shecontinued--"fifty. Twenty-five is too wordly-wise; thirty is apt to bepale from overwork; forty is the age of long stories that take a wholecigar to tell; sixty is--oh, sixty is too near seventy; but fifty isthe mellow age. I love fifty. "

Fifty seemed to Benjamin a glorious age. He longed passionately to befifty. 

"I've always said, " went on Hildegarde, "that I'd rather marry a manof fifty and be taken care of than many a man of thirty and take careof _him_. "

For Benjamin the rest of the evening was bathed in a honey-colouredmist. Hildegarde gave him two more dances, and they discovered thatthey were marvellously in accord on all the questions of the day. Shewas to go driving with him on the following Sunday, and then theywould discuss all these questions further. 

Going home in the phaeton just before the crack of dawn, when thefirst bees were humming and the fading moon glimmered in the cool dew, Benjamin knew vaguely that his father was discussing wholesalehardware. 

". . . . And what do you think should merit our biggest attention afterhammers and nails?" the elder Button was saying. 

"Love, " replied Benjamin absent-mindedly. 

"Lugs?" exclaimed Roger Button, "Why, I've just covered the questionof lugs. "

Benjamin regarded him with dazed eyes just as the eastern sky wassuddenly cracked with light, and an oriole yawned piercingly in thequickening trees. . . 

6

When, six months later, the engagement of Miss Hildegarde Moncrief toMr. Benjamin Button was made known (I say "made known, " for GeneralMoncrief declared he would rather fall upon his sword than announceit), the excitement in Baltimore society reached a feverish pitch. Thealmost forgotten story of Benjamin's birth was remembered and sent outupon the winds of scandal in picaresque and incredible forms. It wassaid that Benjamin was really the father of Roger Button, that he washis brother who had been in prison for forty years, that he was JohnWilkes Booth in disguise--and, finally, that he had two small conicalhorns sprouting from his head. 

The Sunday supplements of the New York papers played up the case withfascinating sketches which showed the head of Benjamin Button attachedto a fish, to a snake, and, finally, to a body of solid brass. Hebecame known, journalistically, as the Mystery Man of Maryland. Butthe true story, as is usually the case, had a very small circulation. 

However, every one agreed with General Moncrief that it was "criminal"for a lovely girl who could have married any beau in Baltimore tothrow herself into the arms of a man who was assuredly fifty. In vainMr. Roger Button published Us son's birth certificate in large type inthe Baltimore _Blaze_. No one believed it. You had only to lookat Benjamin and see. 

On the part of the two people most concerned there was no wavering. Somany of the stories about her fiancé were false that Hildegarderefused stubbornly to believe even the true one. In vain GeneralMoncrief pointed out to her the high mortality among men of fifty--or, at least, among men who looked fifty; in vain he told her of theinstability of the wholesale hardware business. Hildegarde had chosento marry for mellowness, and marry she did. . . . 

7

In one particular, at least, the friends of Hildegarde Moncrief weremistaken. The wholesale hardware business prospered amazingly. In thefifteen years between Benjamin Button's marriage in 1880 and hisfather's retirement in 1895, the family fortune was doubled--and thiswas due largely to the younger member of the firm. 

Needless to say, Baltimore eventually received the couple to itsbosom. Even old General Moncrief became reconciled to his son-in-lawwhen Benjamin gave him the money to bring out his _History of theCivil War_ in twenty volumes, which had been refused by nineprominent publishers. 

In Benjamin himself fifteen years had wrought many changes. It seemedto him that the blood flowed with new vigour through his veins. Itbegan to be a pleasure to rise in the morning, to walk with an activestep along the busy, sunny street, to work untiringly with hisshipments of hammers and his cargoes of nails. It was in 1890 that heexecuted his famous business coup: he brought up the suggestion that_all nails used in nailing up the boxes in which nails are shippedare the property of the shippee_, a proposal which became astatute, was approved by Chief Justice Fossile, and saved Roger Buttonand Company, Wholesale Hardware, more than _six hundred nails everyyear_. 

In addition, Benjamin discovered that he was becoming more and moreattracted by the gay side of life. It was typical of his growingenthusiasm for pleasure that he was the first man in the city ofBaltimore to own and run an automobile. Meeting him on the street, hiscontemporaries would stare enviously at the picture he made of healthand vitality. 

"He seems to grow younger every year, " they would remark. And if oldRoger Button, now sixty-five years old, had failed at first to give aproper welcome to his son he atoned at last by bestowing on him whatamounted to adulation. 

And here we come to an unpleasant subject which it will be well topass over as quickly as possible. There was only one thing thatworried Benjamin Button; his wife had ceased to attract him. 

At that time Hildegarde was a woman of thirty-five, with a son, Roscoe, fourteen years old. In the early days of their marriageBenjamin had worshipped her. But, as the years passed, herhoney-coloured hair became an unexciting brown, the blue enamel of hereyes assumed the aspect of cheap crockery--moreover, and, most of all, she had become too settled in her ways, too placid, too content, tooanaemic in her excitements, and too sober in her taste. As a bride itbeen she who had "dragged" Benjamin to dances and dinners--nowconditions were reversed. She went out socially with him, but withoutenthusiasm, devoured already by that eternal inertia which comes tolive with each of us one day and stays with us to the end. 

Benjamin's discontent waxed stronger. At the outbreak of theSpanish-American War in 1898 his home had for him so little charm thathe decided to join the army. With his business influence he obtained acommission as captain, and proved so adaptable to the work that he wasmade a major, and finally a lieutenant-colonel just in time toparticipate in the celebrated charge up San Juan Hill. He was slightlywounded, and received a medal. 

Benjamin had become so attached to the activity and excitement ofarray life that he regretted to give it up, but his business requiredattention, so he resigned his commission and came home. He was met atthe station by a brass band and escorted to his house. 

8

Hildegarde, waving a large silk flag, greeted him on the porch, andeven as he kissed her he felt with a sinking of the heart that thesethree years had taken their toll. She was a woman of forty now, with afaint skirmish line of gray hairs in her head. The sight depressedhim. 

Up in his room he saw his reflection in the familiar mirror--he wentcloser and examined his own face with anxiety, comparing it after amoment with a photograph of himself in uniform taken just before thewar. 

"Good Lord!" he said aloud. The process was continuing. There was nodoubt of it--he looked now like a man of thirty. Instead of beingdelighted, he was uneasy--he was growing younger. He had hithertohoped that once he reached a bodily age equivalent to his age inyears, the grotesque phenomenon which had marked his birth would ceaseto function. He shuddered. His destiny seemed to him awful, incredible. 

When he came downstairs Hildegarde was waiting for him. She appearedannoyed, and he wondered if she had at last discovered that there wassomething amiss. It was with an effort to relieve the tension betweenthem that he broached the matter at dinner in what he considered adelicate way. 

"Well, " he remarked lightly, "everybody says I look younger thanever. "

Hildegarde regarded him with scorn. She sniffed. "Do you think it'sanything to boast about?"

"I'm not boasting, " he asserted uncomfortably. She sniffed again. "Theidea, " she said, and after a moment: "I should think you'd have enoughpride to stop it. "

"How can I?" he demanded. 

"I'm not going to argue with you, " she retorted. "But there's a rightway of doing things and a wrong way. If you've made up your mind to bedifferent from everybody else, I don't suppose I can stop you, but Ireally don't think it's very considerate. "

"But, Hildegarde, I can't help it. "

"You can too. You're simply stubborn. You think you don't want to belike any one else. You always have been that way, and you always willbe. But just think how it would be if every one else looked at thingsas you do--what would the world be like?"

As this was an inane and unanswerable argument Benjamin made no reply, and from that time on a chasm began to widen between them. He wonderedwhat possible fascination she had ever exercised over him. 

To add to the breach, he found, as the new century gathered headway, that his thirst for gaiety grew stronger. Never a party of any kind inthe city of Baltimore but he was there, dancing with the prettiest ofthe young married women, chatting with the most popular of thedebutantes, and finding their company charming, while his wife, adowager of evil omen, sat among the chaperons, now in haughtydisapproval, and now following him with solemn, puzzled, andreproachful eyes. 

"Look!" people would remark. "What a pity! A young fellow that agetied to a woman of forty-five. He must be twenty years younger thanhis wife. " They had forgotten--as people inevitably forget--that backin 1880 their mammas and papas had also remarked about this sameill-matched pair. 

Benjamin's growing unhappiness at home was compensated for by his manynew interests. He took up golf and made a great success of it. He wentin for dancing: in 1906 he was an expert at "The Boston, " and in 1908he was considered proficient at the "Maxine, " while in 1909 his"Castle Walk" was the envy of every young man in town. 

His social activities, of course, interfered to some extent with hisbusiness, but then he had worked hard at wholesale hardware fortwenty-five years and felt that he could soon hand it on to his son, Roscoe, who had recently graduated from Harvard. 

He and his son were, in fact, often mistaken for each other. Thispleased Benjamin--he soon forgot the insidious fear which had comeover him on his return from the Spanish-American War, and grew to takea naïve pleasure in his appearance. There was only one fly in thedelicious ointment--he hated to appear in public with his wife. Hildegarde was almost fifty, and the sight of her made him feelabsurd. . . . 

9

One September day in 1910--a few years after Roger Button & Co. , Wholesale Hardware, had been handed over to young Roscoe Button--aman, apparently about twenty years old, entered himself as a freshmanat Harvard University in Cambridge. He did not make the mistake ofannouncing that he would never see fifty again, nor did he mention thefact that his son had been graduated from the same institution tenyears before. 

He was admitted, and almost immediately attained a prominent positionin the class, partly because he seemed a little older than the otherfreshmen, whose average age was about eighteen. 

But his success was largely due to the fact that in the football gamewith Yale he played so brilliantly, with so much dash and with such acold, remorseless anger that he scored seven touchdowns and fourteenfield goals for Harvard, and caused one entire eleven of Yale men tobe carried singly from the field, unconscious. He was the mostcelebrated man in college. 

Strange to say, in his third or junior year he was scarcely able to"make" the team. The coaches said that he had lost weight, and itseemed to the more observant among them that he was not quite as tallas before. He made no touchdowns--indeed, he was retained on the teamchiefly in hope that his enormous reputation would bring terror anddisorganisation to the Yale team. 

In his senior year he did not make the team at all. He had grown soslight and frail that one day he was taken by some sophomores for afreshman, an incident which humiliated him terribly. He became knownas something of a prodigy--a senior who was surely no more thansixteen--and he was often shocked at the worldliness of some of hisclassmates. His studies seemed harder to him--he felt that they weretoo advanced. He had heard his classmates speak of St. Midas's, thefamous preparatory school, at which so many of them had prepared forcollege, and he determined after his graduation to enter himself atSt. Midas's, where the sheltered life among boys his own size would bemore congenial to him. 

Upon his graduation in 1914 he went home to Baltimore with his Harvarddiploma in his pocket. Hildegarde was now residing in Italy, soBenjamin went to live with his son, Roscoe. But though he was welcomedin a general way there was obviously no heartiness in Roscoe's feelingtoward him--there was even perceptible a tendency on his son's part tothink that Benjamin, as he moped about the house in adolescentmooniness, was somewhat in the way. Roscoe was married now andprominent in Baltimore life, and he wanted no scandal to creep out inconnection with his family. 

Benjamin, no longer _persona grata_ with the débutantes andyounger college set, found himself left much done, except for thecompanionship of three or four fifteen-year-old boys in theneighbourhood. His idea of going to St. Midas's school recurred tohim. 

"Say, " he said to Roscoe one day, "I've told you over and over that Iwant to go to prep, school. "

"Well, go, then, " replied Roscoe shortly. The matter was distastefulto him, and he wished to avoid a discussion. 

"I can't go alone, " said Benjamin helplessly. "You'll have to enter meand take me up there. "

"I haven't got time, " declared Roscoe abruptly. His eyes narrowed andhe looked uneasily at his father. "As a matter of fact, " he added, "you'd better not go on with this business much longer. You betterpull up short. You better--you better"--he paused and his facecrimsoned as he sought for words--"you better turn right around andstart back the other way. This has gone too far to be a joke. It isn'tfunny any longer. You--you behave yourself!"

Benjamin looked at him, on the verge of tears. 

"And another thing, " continued Roscoe, "when visitors are in the houseI want you to call me 'Uncle'--not 'Roscoe, ' but 'Uncle, ' do youunderstand? It looks absurd for a boy of fifteen to call me by myfirst name. Perhaps you'd better call me 'Uncle' _all_ the time, so you'll get used to it. "

With a harsh look at his father, Roscoe turned away. . . . 

10

At the termination of this interview, Benjamin wandered dismallyupstairs and stared at himself in the mirror. He had not shaved forthree months, but he could find nothing on his face but a faint whitedown with which it seemed unnecessary to meddle. When he had firstcome home from Harvard, Roscoe had approached him with the propositionthat he should wear eye-glasses and imitation whiskers glued to hischeeks, and it had seemed for a moment that the farce of his earlyyears was to be repeated. But whiskers had itched and made himashamed. He wept and Roscoe had reluctantly relented. 

Benjamin opened a book of boys' stories, _The Boy Scouts in BiminiBay_, and began to read. But he found himself thinking persistentlyabout the war. America had joined the Allied cause during thepreceding month, and Benjamin wanted to enlist, but, alas, sixteen wasthe minimum age, and he did not look that old. His true age, which wasfifty-seven, would have disqualified him, anyway. 

There was a knock at his door, and the butler appeared with a letterbearing a large official legend in the corner and addressed to Mr. Benjamin Button. Benjamin tore it open eagerly, and read the enclosurewith delight. It informed him that many reserve officers who hadserved in the Spanish-American War were being called back into servicewith a higher rank, and it enclosed his commission as brigadier-generalin the United States army with orders to report immediately. 

Benjamin jumped to his feet fairly quivering with enthusiasm. This waswhat he had wanted. He seized his cap, and ten minutes later he hadentered a large tailoring establishment on Charles Street, and askedin his uncertain treble to be measured for a uniform. 

"Want to play soldier, sonny?" demanded a clerk casually. 

Benjamin flushed. "Say! Never mind what I want!" he retorted angrily. "My name's Button and I live on Mt. Vernon Place, so you know I'm goodfor it. "

"Well, " admitted the clerk hesitantly, "if you're not, I guess yourdaddy is, all right. "

Benjamin was measured, and a week later his uniform was completed. Hehad difficulty in obtaining the proper general's insignia because thedealer kept insisting to Benjamin that a nice V. W. C. A. Badge wouldlook just as well and be much more fun to play with. 

Saying nothing to Roscoe, he left the house one night and proceeded bytrain to Camp Mosby, in South Carolina, where he was to command aninfantry brigade. On a sultry April day he approached the entrance tothe camp, paid off the taxicab which had brought him from the station, and turned to the sentry on guard. 

"Get some one to handle my luggage!" he said briskly. 

The sentry eyed him reproachfully. "Say, " he remarked, "where yougoin' with the general's duds, sonny?"

Benjamin, veteran of the Spanish-American War, whirled upon him withfire in his eye, but with, alas, a changing treble voice. 

"Come to attention!" he tried to thunder; he paused for breath--thensuddenly he saw the sentry snap his heels together and bring his rifleto the present. Benjamin concealed a smile of gratification, but whenhe glanced around his smile faded. It was not he who had inspiredobedience, but an imposing artillery colonel who was approaching onhorseback. 

"Colonel!" called Benjamin shrilly. 

The colonel came up, drew rein, and looked coolly down at him with atwinkle in his eyes. "Whose little boy are you?" he demanded kindly. 

"I'll soon darn well show you whose little boy I am!" retortedBenjamin in a ferocious voice. "Get down off that horse!"

The colonel roared with laughter. 

"You want him, eh, general?"

"Here!" cried Benjamin desperately. "Read this. " And he thrust hiscommission toward the colonel. The colonel read it, his eyes poppingfrom their sockets. "Where'd you get this?" he demanded, slipping thedocument into his own pocket. "I got it from the Government, as you'llsoon find out!" "You come along with me, " said the colonel with apeculiar look. "We'll go up to headquarters and talk this over. Comealong. " The colonel turned and began walking his horse in thedirection of headquarters. There was nothing for Benjamin to do butfollow with as much dignity as possible--meanwhile promising himself astern revenge. But this revenge did not materialise. Two days later, however, his son Roscoe materialised from Baltimore, hot and crossfrom a hasty trip, and escorted the weeping general, _sans_uniform, back to his home. 

II

In 1920 Roscoe Button's first child was born. During the attendantfestivities, however, no one thought it "the thing" to mention, thatthe little grubby boy, apparently about ten years of age who playedaround the house with lead soldiers and a miniature circus, was thenew baby's own grandfather. 

No one disliked the little boy whose fresh, cheerful face was crossedwith just a hint of sadness, but to Roscoe Button his presence was asource of torment. In the idiom of his generation Roscoe did notconsider the matter "efficient. " It seemed to him that his father, inrefusing to look sixty, had not behaved like a "red-bloodedhe-man"--this was Roscoe's favourite expression--but in a curious andperverse manner. Indeed, to think about the matter for as much as ahalf an hour drove him to the edge of insanity. Roscoe believed that"live wires" should keep young, but carrying it out on such a scalewas--was--was inefficient. And there Roscoe rested. 

Five years later Roscoe's little boy had grown old enough to playchildish games with little Benjamin under the supervision of the samenurse. Roscoe took them both to kindergarten on the same day, andBenjamin found that playing with little strips of coloured paper, making mats and chains and curious and beautiful designs, was the mostfascinating game in the world. Once he was bad and had to stand in thecorner--then he cried--but for the most part there were gay hours inthe cheerful room, with the sunlight coming in the windows and MissBailey's kind hand resting for a moment now and then in his tousledhair. 

Roscoe's son moved up into the first grade after a year, but Benjaminstayed on in the kindergarten. He was very happy. Sometimes when othertots talked about what they would do when they grew up a shadow wouldcross his little face as if in a dim, childish way he realised thatthose were things in which he was never to share. 

The days flowed on in monotonous content. He went back a third year tothe kindergarten, but he was too little now to understand what thebright shining strips of paper were for. He cried because the otherboys were bigger than he, and he was afraid of them. The teachertalked to him, but though he tried to understand he could notunderstand at all. 

He was taken from the kindergarten. His nurse, Nana, in her starchedgingham dress, became the centre of his tiny world. On bright daysthey walked in the park; Nana would point at a great gray monster andsay "elephant, " and Benjamin would say it after her, and when he wasbeing undressed for bed that night he would say it over and over aloudto her: "Elyphant, elyphant, elyphant. " Sometimes Nana let him jump onthe bed, which was fun, because if you sat down exactly right it wouldbounce you up on your feet again, and if you said "Ah" for a long timewhile you jumped you got a very pleasing broken vocal effect. 

He loved to take a big cane from the hat-rack and go around hittingchairs and tables with it and saying: "Fight, fight, fight. " Whenthere were people there the old ladies would cluck at him, whichinterested him, and the young ladies would try to kiss him, which hesubmitted to with mild boredom. And when the long day was done at fiveo'clock he would go upstairs with Nana and be fed on oatmeal and nicesoft mushy foods with a spoon. 

There were no troublesome memories in his childish sleep; no tokencame to him of his brave days at college, of the glittering years whenhe flustered the hearts of many girls. There were only the white, safewalls of his crib and Nana and a man who came to see him sometimes, and a great big orange ball that Nana pointed at just before histwilight bed hour and called "sun. " When the sun went his eyes weresleepy--there were no dreams, no dreams to haunt him. 

The past--the wild charge at the head of his men up San Juan Hill; thefirst years of his marriage when he worked late into the summer duskdown in the busy city for young Hildegarde whom he loved; the daysbefore that when he sat smoking far into the night in the gloomy oldButton house on Monroe Street with his grandfather-all these had fadedlike unsubstantial dreams from his mind as though they had never been. He did not remember. 

He did not remember clearly whether the milk was warm or cool at hislast feeding or how the days passed--there was only his crib andNana's familiar presence. And then he remembered nothing. When he washungry he cried--that was all. Through the noons and nights hebreathed and over him there were soft mumblings and murmurings that hescarcely heard, and faintly differentiated smells, and light anddarkness. 

Then it was all dark, and his white crib and the dim faces that movedabove him, and the warm sweet aroma of the milk, faded out altogetherfrom his mind. 

TARQUIN OF CHEAPSIDE

Running footsteps--light, soft-soled shoes made of curious leatherycloth brought from Ceylon setting the pace; thick flowing boots, twopairs, dark blue and gilt, reflecting the moonlight in blunt gleamsand splotches, following a stone's throw behind. 

Soft Shoes flashes through a patch of moonlight, then darts into ablind labyrinth of alleys and becomes only an intermittent scuffleahead somewhere in the enfolding darkness. In go Flowing Boots, withshort swords lurching and long plumes awry, finding a breath to curseGod and the black lanes of London. 

Soft Shoes leaps a shadowy gate and crackles through a hedgerow. Flowing Boots leap the gate and crackles through the hedgerow--andthere, startlingly, is the watch ahead--two murderous pikemen offerocious cast of mouth acquired in Holland and the Spanish marches. 

But there is no cry for help. The pursued does not fall panting at thefeet of the watch, clutching a purse; neither do the pursuers raise ahue and cry. Soft Shoes goes by in a rush of swift air. The watchcurse and hesitate, glance after the fugitive, and then spread theirpikes grimly across the road and wait for Flowing Boots. Darkness, like a great hand, cuts off the even flow the moon. 

The hand moves off the moon whose pale caress finds again the eavesand lintels, and the watch, wounded and tumbled in the dust. Up thestreet one of Flowing Boots leaves a black trail of spots until hebinds himself, clumsily as he runs, with fine lace caught from histhroat. 

It was no affair for the watch: Satan was at large tonight and Satanseemed to be he who appeared dimly in front, heel over gate, knee overfence. Moreover, the adversary was obviously travelling near home orat least in that section of London consecrated to his coarser whims, for the street narrowed like a road in a picture and the houses bentover further and further, cooping in natural ambushes suitable formurder and its histrionic sister, sudden death. 

Down long and sinuous lanes twisted the hunted and the harriers, always in and out of the moon in a perpetual queen's move over achecker-board of glints and patches. Ahead, the quarry, minus hisleather jerkin now and half blinded by drips of sweat, had taken toscanning his ground desperately on both sides. As a result he suddenlyslowed short, and retracing his steps a bit scooted up an alley sodark that it seemed that here sun and moon had been in eclipse sincethe last glacier slipped roaring over the earth. Two hundred yardsdown he stopped and crammed himself into a niche in the wall where hehuddled and panted silently, a grotesque god without bulk or outlinein the gloom. 

Flowing Boots, two pairs, drew near, came up, went by, halted twentyyards beyond him, and spoke in deep-lunged, scanty whispers:

"I was attune to that scuffle; it stopped. "

"Within twenty paces. "

"He's hid. "

"Stay together now and we'll cut him up. "

The voice faded into a low crunch of a boot, nor did Soft Shoes waitto hear more--he sprang in three leaps across the alley, where hebounded up, flapped for a moment on the top of the wall like a hugebird, and disappeared, gulped down by the hungry night at a mouthful. 

II

 "He read at wine, he read in bed, He read aloud, had he the breath, His every thought was with the dead, And so he read himself to death. "

Any visitor to the old James the First graveyard near Peat's Hill mayspell out this bit of doggerel, undoubtedly one of the worst recordedof an Elizabethan, on the tomb of Wessel Caster. 

This death of his, says the antiquary, occurred when he wasthirty-seven, but as this story is concerned with the night of acertain chase through darkness, we find him still alive, stillreading. His eyes were somewhat dim, his stomach somewhat obvious-hewas a mis-built man and indolent--oh, Heavens! But an era is an era, and in the reign of Elizabeth, by the grace of Luther, Queen ofEngland, no man could help but catch the spirit of enthusiasm. Everyloft in Cheapside published its _Magnum Folium_ (or magazine)--ofits new blank verse; the Cheapside Players would produce anything onsight as long as it "got away from those reactionary miracle plays, "and the English Bible had run through seven "very large" printings in, as many months. 

So Wessel Caxter (who in his youth had gone to sea) was now a readerof all on which he could lay his hands--he read manuscripts In holyfriendship; he dined rotten poets; he loitered about the shops wherethe _Magna Folia_ were printed, and he listened tolerantly whilethe young playwrights wrangled and bickered among them-selves, andbehind each other's backs made bitter and malicious charges ofplagiarism or anything else they could think of. 

To-night he had a book, a piece of work which, though inordinatelyversed, contained, he thought, some rather excellent political satire. "The Faerie Queene" by Edmund Spenser lay before him under thetremulous candle-light. He had ploughed through a canto; he wasbeginning another:

THE LEGEND OF BRITOMARTIS OR OF CHASTITY

 _It falls me here to write of Chastity. The fayrest vertue, far above the rest_. . . . 

A sudden rush of feet on the stairs, a rusty swing-open of the thindoor, and a man thrust himself into the room, a man without a jerkin, panting, sobbing, on the verge of collapse. 

"Wessel, " words choked him, "stick me away somewhere, love of OurLady!"

Caxter rose, carefully closing his book, and bolted the door in someconcern. 

"I'm pursued, " cried out Soft Shoes. "I vow there's two short-wittedblades trying to make me into mincemeat and near succeeding. They sawme hop the back wall!"

"It would need, " said Wessel, looking at him curiously, "severalbattalions armed with blunderbusses, and two or three Armadas, to keepyou reasonably secure from the revenges of the world. "

Soft Shoes smiled with satisfaction. His sobbing gasps were giving wayto quick, precise breathing; his hunted air had faded to a faintlyperturbed irony. 

"I feel little surprise, " continued Wessel. 

"They were two such dreary apes. "

"Making a total of three. "

"Only two unless you stick me away. Man, man, come alive, they'll beon the stairs in a spark's age. "

Wessel took a dismantled pike-staff from the corner, and raising it tothe high ceiling, dislodged a rough trap-door opening into a garretabove. 

"There's no ladder. "

He moved a bench under the trap, upon which Soft Shoes mounted, crouched, hesitated, crouched again, and then leaped amazingly upward. He caught at the edge of the aperture and swung back and forth, for amoment, shifting his hold; finally doubled up and disappeared into thedarkness above. There was a scurry, a migration of rats, as thetrap-door was replaced;. . . Silence. 

Wessel returned to his reading-table, opened to the Legend ofBritomartis or of Chastity--and waited. Almost a minute later therewas a scramble on the stairs and an intolerable hammering at the door. Wessel sighed and, picking up his candle, rose. 

"Who's there?"

"Open the door!"

"Who's there?"

An aching blow frightened the frail wood, splintered it around theedge. Wessel opened it a scarce three inches, and held the candlehigh. His was to play the timorous, the super-respectable citizen, disgracefully disturbed. 

"One small hour of the night for rest. Is that too much to ask fromevery brawler and---"

"Quiet, gossip! Have you seen a perspiring fellow?"

The shadows of two gallants fell in immense wavering outlines over thenarrow stairs; by the light Wessel scrutinized them closely. Gentlemen, they were, hastily but richly dressed--one of them woundedseverely in the hand, both radiating a sort of furious horror. Wavingaside Wessel's ready miscomprehension, they pushed by him into theroom and with their swords went through the business of pokingcarefully into all suspected dark spots in the room, further extendingtheir search to Wessel's bedchamber. 

"Is he hid here?" demanded the wounded man fiercely. 

"Is who here?"

"Any man but you. "

"Only two others that I know of. "

For a second Wessel feared that he had been too damned funny, for thegallants made as though to prick him through. 

"I heard a man on the stairs, " he said hastily, "full five minutesago, it was. He most certainly failed to come up. "

He went on to explain his absorption in "The Faerie Queene" but, forthe moment at least, his visitors, like the great saints, wereanaesthetic to culture. 

"What's been done?" inquired Wessel. 

"Violence!" said the man with the wounded hand. Wessel noticed thathis eyes were quite wild. "My own sister. Oh, Christ in heaven, giveus this man!"

Wessel winced. 

"Who is the man?"

"God's word! We know not even that. What's that trap up there?" headded suddenly. 

"It's nailed down. It's not been used for years. " He thought of thepole in the corner and quailed in his belly, but the utter despair ofthe two men dulled their astuteness. 

"It would take a ladder for any one not a tumbler, " said the woundedman listlessly. 

His companion broke into hysterical laughter. 

"A tumbler. Oh, a tumbler. Oh---"

Wessel stared at them in wonder. 

"That appeals to my most tragic humor, " cried the man, "that noone--oh, no one--could get up there but a tumbler. "

The gallant with the wounded hand snapped his good fingersimpatiently. 

"We must go next door--and then on--"

Helplessly they went as two walking under a dark and storm-swept sky. 

Wessel closed and bolted the door and stood a moment by it, frowningin pity. 

A low-breathed "Ha!" made him look up. Soft Shoes had already raisedthe trap and was looking down into the room, his rather elfish facesqueezed into a grimace, half of distaste, half of sardonic amusement. 

"They take off their heads with their helmets, " he remarked in awhisper, "but as for you and me, Wessel, we are two cunning men. "

"Now you be cursed, " cried Wessel vehemently. "I knew you for a dog, but when I hear even the half of a tale like this, I know you for sucha dirty cur that I am minded to club your skull. "

Soft Shoes stared at him, blinking. 

"At all events, " he replied finally, "I find dignity impossible inthis position. "

With this he let his body through the trap, hung for an instant, anddropped the seven feet to the floor. 

"There was a rat considered my ear with the air of a gourmet, " hecontinued, dusting his hands on his breeches. "I told him in the rat'speculiar idiom that I was deadly poison, so he took himself off. "

"Let's hear of this night's lechery!" insisted Wessel angrily. 

Soft Shoes touched his thumb to his nose and wiggled the fingersderisively at Wessel. 

"Street gamin!" muttered Wessel. 

"Have you any paper?" demanded Soft Shoes irrelevantly, and thenrudely added, "or can you write?"

"Why should I give you paper?"

"You wanted to hear of the night's entertainment. So you shall, an yougive me pen, ink, a sheaf of paper, and a room to myself. "

Wessel hesitated. 

"Get out!" he said finally. 

"As you will. Yet you have missed a most intriguing story. "

Wessel wavered--he was soft as taffy, that man--gave in. Soft Shoeswent into the adjoining room with the begrudged writing materials andprecisely closed the door. Wessel grunted and returned to "The FaerieQueene"; so silence came once more upon the house. 

III

Three o'clock went into four. The room paled, the dark outside wasshot through with damp and chill, and Wessel, cupping his brain in hishands, bent low over his table, tracing through the pattern of knightsand fairies and the harrowing distresses of many girls. There weredragons chortling along the narrow street outside; when the sleepyarmorer's boy began his work at half-past five the heavy clink andclank of plate and linked mail swelled to the echo of a marchingcavalcade. 

A fog shut down at the first flare of dawn, and the room was grayishyellow at six when Wessel tiptoed to his cupboard bedchamber andpulled open the door. His guest turned on him a face pale as parchmentin which two distraught eyes burned like great red letters. He haddrawn a chair close to Wessel's _prie-dieu_ which he was using asa desk; and on it was an amazing stack of closely written pages. Witha long sigh Wessel withdrew and returned to his siren, calling himselffool for not claiming his bed here at dawn. 

The dump of boots outside, the croaking of old beldames from attic toattic, the dull murmur of morning, unnerved him, and, dozing, heslumped in his chair, his brain, overladen with sound and color, working intolerably over the imagery that stacked it. In this restlessdream of his he was one of a thousand groaning bodies crushed near thesun, a helpless bridge for the strong-eyed Apollo. The dream tore athim, scraped along his mind like a ragged knife. When a hot handtouched his shoulder, he awoke with what was nearly a scream to findthe fog thick in the room and his guest, a gray ghost of misty stuff, beside him with a pile of paper in his hand. 

"It should be a most intriguing tale, I believe, though it requiressome going over. May I ask you to lock it away, and in God's name letme sleep?"

He waited for no answer, but thrust the pile at Wessel, and literallypoured himself like stuff from a suddenly inverted bottle upon a couchin the corner, slept, with his breathing regular, but his browwrinkled in a curious and somewhat uncanny manner. 

Wessel yawned sleepily and, glancing at the scrawled, uncertain firstpage, he began reading aloud very softly:

 _The Rape of Lucrece

 "From the besieged Ardea all in post, Borne by the trustless wings of false desire, Lust-breathing Tarquin leaves the Roman host--"_

"O RUSSET WITCH!"

Merlin Grainger was employed by the Moonlight Quill Bookshop, whichyou may have visited, just around the corner from the Ritz-Carlton onForty-seventh Street. The Moonlight Quill is, or rather was, a veryromantic little store, considered radical and admitted dark. It wasspotted interiorly with red and orange posters of breathless exoticintent, and lit no less by the shiny reflecting bindings of specialeditions than by the great squat lamp of crimson satin that, lightedthrough all the day, swung overhead. It was truly a mellow bookshop. The words "Moonlight Quill" were worked over the door in a sort ofserpentine embroidery. The windows seemed always full of somethingthat had passed the literary censors with little to spare; volumeswith covers of deep orange which offer their titles on little whitepaper squares. And over all there was the smell of the musk, which theclever, inscrutable Mr. Moonlight Quill ordered to be sprinkledabout-the smell half of a curiosity shop in Dickens' London and halfof a coffee-house on the warm shores of the Bosphorus. 

From nine until five-thirty Merlin Grainger asked bored old ladies inblack and young men with dark circles under their eyes if they "caredfor this fellow" or were interested in first editions. Did they buynovels with Arabs on the cover, or books which gave Shakespeare'snewest sonnets as dictated psychically to Miss Sutton of South Dakota?he sniffed. As a matter of fact, his own taste ran to these latter, but as an employee at the Moonlight Quill he assumed for the workingday the attitude of a disillusioned connoisseur. 

After he had crawled over the window display to pull down the frontshade at five-thirty every afternoon, and said good-bye to themysterious Mr. Moonlight Quill and the lady clerk, Miss McCracken, andthe lady stenographer, Miss Masters, he went home to the girl, Caroline. He did not eat supper with Caroline. It is unbelievable thatCaroline would have considered eating off his bureau with the collarbuttons dangerously near the cottage cheese, and the ends of Merlin'snecktie just missing his glass of milk--he had never asked her to eatwith him. He ate alone. He went into Braegdort's delicatessen on SixthAvenue and bought a box of crackers, a tube of anchovy paste, and someoranges, or else a little jar of sausages and some potato salad and abottled soft drink, and with these in a brown package he went to hisroom at Fifty-something West Fifty-eighth Street and ate his supperand saw Caroline. 

Caroline was a very young and gay person who lived with some olderlady and was possibly nineteen. She was like a ghost in that she neverexisted until evening. She sprang into life when the lights went on inher apartment at about six, and she disappeared, at the latest, aboutmidnight. Her apartment was a nice one, in a nice building with awhite stone front, opposite the south side of Central Park. The backof her apartment faced the single window of the single room occupiedby the single Mr. Grainger. 

He called her Caroline because there was a picture that looked likeher on the jacket of a book of that name down at the Moonlight Quill. 

Now, Merlin Grainger was a thin young man of twenty-five, with darkhair and no mustache or beard or anything like that, but Caroline wasdazzling and light, with a shimmering morass of russet waves to takethe place of hair, and the sort of features that remind you ofkisses--the sort of features you thought belonged to your first love, but know, when you come across an old picture, didn't. She dressed inpink or blue usually, but of late she had sometimes put on a slenderblack gown that was evidently her especial pride, for whenever shewore it she would stand regarding a certain place on the wall, whichMerlin thought most be a mirror. She sat usually in the profile chairnear the window, but sometimes honored the _chaise longue_ by thelamp, and often she leaned 'way back and smoked a cigarette withposturings of her arms and hands that Merlin considered very graceful. 

At another time she had come to the window and stood in itmagnificently, and looked out because the moon had lost its way andwas dripping the strangest and most transforming brilliance into theareaway between, turning the motif of ash-cans and clothes-lines intoa vivid impressionism of silver casks and gigantic gossamer cobwebs. Merlin was sitting in plain sight, eating cottage cheese with sugarand milk on it; and so quickly did he reach out for the window cordthat he tipped the cottage cheese into his lap with his free hand--andthe milk was cold and the sugar made spots on his trousers, and he wassure that she had seen him after all. 

Sometimes there were callers--men in dinner coats, who stood andbowed, hat in hand and coat on arm, as they talked to Caroline; thenbowed some more and followed her out of the light, obviously bound fora play or for a dance. Other young men came and sat and smokedcigarettes, and seemed trying to tell Caroline something--she sittingeither in the profile chair and watching them with eager intentness orelse in the _chaise longue_ by the lamp, looking very lovely andyouthfully inscrutable indeed. 

Merlin enjoyed these calls. Of some of the men he approved. Others wononly his grudging toleration, one or two he loathed--especially themost frequent caller, a man with black hair and a black goatee and apitch-dark soul, who seemed to Merlin vaguely familiar, but whom hewas never quite able to recognize. 

Now, Merlin's whole life was not "bound up with this romance he hadconstructed"; it was not "the happiest hour of his day. " He neverarrived in time to rescue Caroline from "clutches"; nor did he evenmarry her. A much stranger thing happened than any of these, and it isthis strange thing that will presently be set down here. It began oneOctober afternoon when she walked briskly into the mellow interior ofthe Moonlight Quill. 

It was a dark afternoon, threatening rain and the end of the world, and done in that particularly gloomy gray in which only New Yorkafternoons indulge. A breeze was crying down the streets, whiskingalong battered newspapers and pieces of things, and little lights werepricking out all the windows--it was so desolate that one was sorryfor the tops of sky-scrapers lost up there in the dark green and grayheaven, and felt that now surely the farce was to close, and presentlyall the buildings would collapse like card houses, and pile up in adusty, sardonic heap upon all the millions who presumed to wind in andout of them. 

At least these were the sort of musings that lay heavily upon the soulof Merlin Grainger, as he stood by the window putting a dozen booksback in a row after a cyclonic visit by a lady with ermine trimmings. He looked out of the window full of the most distressing thoughts--ofthe early novels of H. G. Wells, of the boot of Genesis, of how ThomasEdison had said that in thirty years there would be no dwelling-housesupon the island, but only a vast and turbulent bazaar; and then he setthe last book right side up, turned--and Caroline walked coolly intothe shop. 

She was dressed in a jaunty but conventional walking costume--heremembered this when he thought about it later. Her skirt was plaid, pleated like a concertina; her jacket was a soft but brisk tan; hershoes and spats were brown and her hat, small and trim, completed herlike the top of a very expensive and beautifully filled candy box. 

Merlin, breathless and startled, advanced nervously toward her. 

"Good-afternoon--" he said, and then stopped--why, he did not know, except that it came to him that something very portentous in his lifewas about to occur, and that it would need no furbishing but silence, and the proper amount of expectant attention. And in that minutebefore the thing began to happen he had the sense of a breathlesssecond hanging suspended in time: he saw through the glass partitionthat bounded off the little office the malevolent conical head of hisemployer, Mr. Moonlight Quill, bent over his correspondence. He sawMiss McCracken and Miss Masters as two patches of hair drooping overpiles of paper; he saw the crimson lamp overhead, and noticed with atouch of pleasure how really pleasant and romantic it made thebook-store seem. 

Then the thing happened, or rather it began to happen. Caroline pickedup a volume of poems lying loose upon a pile, fingered it absentlywith her slender white hand, and suddenly, with an easy gesture, tossed it upward toward the ceiling where it disappeared in thecrimson lamp and lodged there, seen through the illuminated silk as adark, bulging rectangle. This pleased her--she broke into young, contagious laughter, in which Merlin found himself presently joining. 

"It stayed up!" she cried merrily. "It stayed up, didn't it?" To bothof them this seemed the height of brilliant absurdity. Their laughtermingled, filled the bookshop, and Merlin was glad to find that hervoice was rich and full of sorcery. 

"Try another, " he found himself suggesting--"try a red one. "

At this her laughter increased, and she had to rest her hands upon thestack to steady herself. 

"Try another, " she managed to articulate between spasms of mirth. "Oh, golly, try another!"

"Try two. "

"Yes, try two. Oh, I'll choke if I don't stop laughing. Here it goes. "

Suiting her action to the word, she picked up a red book and sent itin a gentle hyperbola toward the ceiling, where it sank into the lampbeside the first. It was a few minutes before either of them could domore than rock back and forth in helpless glee; but then by mutualagreement they took up the sport anew, this time in unison. Merlinseized a large, specially bound French classic and whirled it upward. Applauding his own accuracy, he took a best-seller in one hand and abook on barnacles in the other, and waited breathlessly while she madeher shot. Then the business waxed fast and furious--sometimes theyalternated, and, watching, he found how supple she was in everymovement; sometimes one of them made shot after shot, picking up thenearest book, sending it off, merely taking time to follow it with aglance before reaching for another. Within three minutes they hadcleared a little place on the table, and the lamp of crimson satin wasso bulging with books that it was near breaking. 

"Silly game, basket-ball, " she cried scornfully as a book left herhand. "High-school girls play it in hideous bloomers. "

"Idiotic, " he agreed. 

She paused in the act of tossing a book, and replaced it suddenly inits position on the table. 

"I think we've got room to sit down now, " she said gravely. 

They had; they had cleared an ample space for two. With a faint touchof nervousness Merlin glanced toward Mr. Moonlight Quill's glasspartition, but the three heads were still bent earnestly over theirwork, and it was evident that they had not seen what had gone on inthe shop. So when Caroline put her hands on the table and hoistedherself up Merlin calmly imitated her, and they sat side by sidelooking very earnestly at each other. 

"I had to see you, " she began, with a rather pathetic expression inher brown eyes. 

"I know. "

"It was that last time, " she continued, her voice trembling a little, though she tried to keep it steady. "I was frightened. I don't likeyou to eat off the dresser. I'm so afraid you'll--you'll swallow acollar button. "

"I did once--almost, " he confessed reluctantly, "but it's not so easy, you know. I mean you can swallow the flat part easy enough or else theother part--that is, separately--but for a whole collar button you'dhave to have a specially made throat. " He was astonishing himself bythe debonnaire appropriateness of his remarks. Words seemed for thefirst time in his life to ran at him shrieking to be used, gatheringthemselves into carefully arranged squads and platoons, and beingpresented to him by punctilious adjutants of paragraphs. 

"That's what scared me, " she said. "I knew you had to have a speciallymade throat--and I knew, at least I felt sure, that you didn't haveone. "

He nodded frankly. 

"I haven't. It costs money to have one--more money unfortunately thanI possess. "

He felt no shame in saying this--rather a delight in making theadmission--he knew that nothing he could say or do would be beyond hercomprehension; least of all his poverty, and the practicalimpossibility of ever extricating himself from it. 

Caroline looked down at her wrist watch, and with a little cry slidfrom the table to her feet. 

"It's after five, " she cried. "I didn't realize. I have to be at theRitz at five-thirty. Let's hurry and get this done. I've got a bet onit. "

With one accord they set to work. Caroline began the matter by seizinga book on insects and sending it whizzing, and finally crashingthrough the glass partition that housed Mr. Moonlight Quill. Theproprietor glanced up with a wild look, brushed a few pieces of glassfrom his desk, and went on with his letters. Miss McCracken gave nosign of having heard--only Miss Masters started and gave a littlefrightened scream before she bent to her task again. 

But to Merlin and Caroline it didn't matter. In a perfect orgy ofenergy they were hurling book after book in all directions untilsometimes three or four were in the air at once, smashing againstshelves, cracking the glass of pictures on the walls, falling inbruised and torn heaps upon the floor. It was fortunate that nocustomers happened to come in, for it is certain they would never havecome in again--the noise was too tremendous, a noise of smashing andripping and tearing, mixed now and then with the tinkling of glass, the quick breathing of the two throwers, and the intermittentoutbursts of laughter to which both of them periodically surrendered. 

At five-thirty Caroline tossed a last book at the lamp, and gave thefinal impetus to the load it carried. The weakened silk tore anddropped its cargo in one vast splattering of white and color to thealready littered floor. Then with a sigh of relief she turned toMerlin and held out her hand. 

"Good-by, " she said simply. 

"Are you going?" He knew she was. His question was simply a lingeringwile to detain her and extract for another moment that dazzlingessence of light he drew from her presence, to continue his enormoussatisfaction in her features, which were like kisses and, he thought, like the features of a girl he had known back in 1910. For a minute hepressed the softness of her hand--then she smiled and withdrew it and, before he could spring to open the door, she had done it herself andwas gone out into the turbid and ominous twilight that broodednarrowly over Forty-seventh Street. 

I would like to tell you how Merlin, having seen how beauty regardsthe wisdom of the years, walked into the little partition of Mr. Moonlight Quill and gave up his job then and there; thence issuing outinto the street a much finer and nobler and increasingly ironic man. But the truth is much more commonplace. Merlin Grainger stood up andsurveyed the wreck of the bookshop, the ruined volumes, the torn silkremnants of the once beautiful crimson lamp, the crystallinesprinkling of broken glass which lay in iridescent dust over the wholeinterior--and then he went to a corner where a broom was kept andbegan cleaning up and rearranging and, as far as he was able, restoring the shop to its former condition. He found that, though somefew of the books were uninjured, most of them had suffered in varyingextents. The backs were off some, the pages were torn from others, still others were just slightly cracked in the front, which, as allcareless book returners know, makes a book unsalable, and thereforesecond-hand. 

Nevertheless by six o'clock he had done much to repair the damage. Hehad returned the books to their original places, swept the floor, andput new lights in the sockets overhead. The red shade itself wasruined beyond redemption, and Merlin thought in some trepidation thatthe money to replace it might have to come out of his salary. At six, therefore, having done the best he could, he crawled over the frontwindow display to pull down the blind. As he was treading delicatelyback, he saw Mr. Moonlight Quill rise from his desk, put on hisovercoat and hat, and emerge into the shop. He nodded mysteriously atMerlin and went toward the door. With his hand on the knob he paused, turned around, and in a voice curiously compounded of ferocity anduncertainty, he said:

"If that girl comes in here again, you tell her to behave. "

With that he opened the door, drowning Merlin's meek "Yessir" in itscreak, and went out. 

Merlin stood there for a moment, deciding wisely not to worry aboutwhat was for the present only a possible futurity, and then he wentinto the back of the shop and invited Miss Masters to have supper withhim at Pulpat's French Restaurant, where one could still obtain redwine at dinner, despite the Great Federal Government. Miss Mastersaccepted. 

"Wine makes me feel all tingly, " she said. 

Merlin laughed inwardly as he compared her to Caroline, or rather ashe didn't compare her. There was no comparison. 

II

Mr. Moonlight Quill, mysterious, exotic, and oriental in temperamentwas, nevertheless, a man of decision. And it was with decision that heapproached the problem of his wrecked shop. Unless he should make anoutlay equal to the original cost of his entire stock--a step whichfor certain private reasons he did not wish to take--it would beimpossible for him to continue in business with the Moonlight Quill asbefore. There was but one thing to do. He promptly turned hisestablishment from an up-to-the-minute book-store into a second-handbookshop. The damaged books were marked down from twenty-five to fiftyper cent, the name over the door whose serpentine embroidery had onceshone so insolently bright, was allowed to grow dim and take on theindescribably vague color of old paint, and, having a strong penchantfor ceremonial, the proprietor even went so far as to buy twoskull-caps of shoddy red felt, one for himself and one for his clerk, Merlin Grainger. Moreover, he let his goatee grow until it resembledthe tail-feathers of an ancient sparrow and substituted for a oncedapper business suit a reverence-inspiring affair of shiny alpaca. 

In fact, within a year after Caroline's catastrophic visit to thebookshop the only thing in it that preserved any semblance of being upto date was Miss Masters. Miss McCracken had followed in the footstepsof Mr. Moonlight Quill and become an intolerable dowd. 

For Merlin too, from a feeling compounded of loyalty and listlessness, had let his exterior take on the semblance of a deserted garden. Heaccepted the red felt skull-cap as a symbol of his decay. Always ayoung man known, as a "pusher, " he had been, since the day of hisgraduation from the manual training department of a New York HighSchool, an inveterate brusher of clothes, hair, teeth, and eveneyebrows, and had learned the value of laying all his clean socks toeupon toe and heel upon heel in a certain drawer of his bureau, whichwould be known as the sock drawer. 

These things, he felt, had won him his place in the greatest splendorof the Moonlight Quill. It was due to them that he was not stillmaking "chests useful for keeping things, " as he was taught withbreathless practicality in High School, and selling them to whoeverhad use of such chests--possibly undertakers. Nevertheless when theprogressive Moonlight Quill became the retrogressive Moonlight Quillhe preferred to sink with it, and so took to letting his suits gatherundisturbed the wispy burdens of the air and to throwing his socksindiscriminately into the shirt drawer, the underwear drawer, and eveninto no drawer at all. It was not uncommon in his new carelessness tolet many of his clean clothes go directly back to the laundry withouthaving ever been worn, a common eccentricity of impoverishedbachelors. And this in the face of his favorite magazines, which atthat time were fairly staggering with articles by successful authorsagainst the frightful impudence of the condemned poor, such as thebuying of wearable shirts and nice cuts of meat, and the fact thatthey preferred good investments in personal jewelry to respectableones in four per cent saving-banks. 

It was indeed a strange state of affairs and a sorry one for manyworthy and God-fearing men. For the first time in the history of theRepublic almost any negro north of Georgia could change a one-dollarbill. But as at that time the cent was rapidly approaching thepurchasing power of the Chinese ubu and was only a thing you got backoccasionally after paying for a soft drink, and could use merely ingetting your correct weight, this was perhaps not so strange aphenomenon as it at first seems. It was too curious a state of things, however, for Merlin Grainger to take the step that he did take--thehazardous, almost involuntary step of proposing to Miss Masters. Stranger still that she accepted him, It was at Pulpat's on Saturday night and over a $1. 75 bottle of waterdiluted with _vin ordinaire_ that the proposal occurred. 

"Wine makes me feel all tingly, doesn't it you?" chattered MissMasters gaily. 

"Yes, " answered Merlin absently; and then, after a long and pregnantpause: "Miss Masters--Olive--I want to say something to you if you'lllisten to me. "

The tingliness of Miss Masters (who knew what was coming) increaseduntil it seemed that she would shortly be electrocuted by her ownnervous reactions. But her "Yes, Merlin, " came without a sign orflicker of interior disturbance. Merlin swallowed a stray bit of airthat he found in his mouth. 

"I have no fortune, " he said with the manner of making anannouncement. "I have no fortune at all. "

Their eyes met, locked, became wistful, and dreamy and beautiful. 

"Olive, " he told her, "I love you. "

"I love you too, Merlin, " she answered simply. "Shall we have anotherbottle of wine?"

"Yes, " he cried, his heart beating at a great rate. "Do you mean--"

"To drink to our engagement, " she interrupted bravely. "May it be ashort one!"

"No!" he almost shouted, bringing his fist fiercely down upon thetable. "May it last forever!"

"What?"

"I mean--oh, I see what you mean. You're right. May it be a shortone. " He laughed and added, "My error. "

After the wine arrived they discussed the matter thoroughly. 

"We'll have to take a small apartment at first, " he said, "and Ibelieve, yes, by golly, I know there's a small one in the house whereI live, a big room and a sort of a dressing-room-kitchenette and theuse of a bath on the same floor. "

She clapped her hands happily, and he thought how pretty she wasreally, that is, the upper part of her face--from the bridge of thenose down she was somewhat out of true. She continued enthusiastically:

"And as soon as we can afford it we'll take a real swell apartment, with an elevator and a telephone girl. "

"And after that a place in the country--and a car. "

"I can't imagine nothing more fun. Can you?"

Merlin fell silent a moment. He was thinking that he would have togive up his room, the fourth floor rear. Yet it mattered very littlenow. During the past year and a half--in fact, from the very date ofCaroline's visit to the Moonlight Quill--he had never seen her. For aweek after that visit her lights had failed to go on--darkness broodedout into the areaway, seemed to grope blindly in at his expectant, uncurtained window. Then the lights had appeared at last, and insteadof Caroline and her callers they stowed a stodgy family--a little manwith a bristly mustache and a full-bosomed woman who spent herevenings patting her hips and rearranging bric-à-brac. After two daysof them Merlin had callously pulled down his shade. 

No, Merlin could think of nothing more fun than rising in the worldwith Olive. There would be a cottage in a suburb, a cottage paintedblue, just one class below the sort of cottages that are of whitestucco with a green roof. In the grass around the cottage would berusty trowels and a broken green bench and a baby-carriage with awicker body that sagged to the left. And around the grass and thebaby-carriage and the cottage itself, around his whole world therewould be the arms of Olive, a little stouter, the arms of herneo-Olivian period, when, as she walked, her cheeks would tremble upand down ever so slightly from too much face-massaging. He could hearher voice now, two spoons' length away:

"I knew you were going to say this to-night, Merlin. I could see--"

She could see. Ah--suddenly he wondered how much she could see. Couldshe see that the girl who had come in with a party of three men andsat down at the next table was Caroline? Ah, could she see that? Couldshe see that the men brought with them liquor far more potent thanPulpat's red ink condensed threefold?. . . 

Merlin stared breathlessly, half-hearing through an auditory etherOlive's low, soft monologue, as like a persistent honey-bee she suckedsweetness from her memorable hour. Merlin was listening to theclinking of ice and the fine laughter of all four at somepleasantry--and that laughter of Caroline's that he knew so wellstirred him, lifted him, called his heart imperiously over to hertable, whither it obediently went. He could see her quite plainly, andhe fancied that in the last year and a half she had changed, if everso slightly. Was it the light or were her cheeks a little thinner andher eyes less fresh, if more liquid, than of old? Yet the shadows werestill purple in her russet hair; her mouth hinted yet of kisses, asdid the profile that came sometimes between his eyes and a row ofbooks, when it was twilight in the bookshop where the crimson lamppresided no more. 

And she had been drinking. The threefold flush in her cheeks wascompounded of youth and wine and fine cosmetic--that he could tell. She was making great amusement for the young man on her left and theportly person on her right, and even for the old fellow opposite her, for the latter from time to time uttered the shocked and mildlyreproachful cackles of another generation. Merlin caught the words ofa song she was intermittently singing--

 _"Just snap your fingers at care, Don't cross the bridge 'til you're there--"_

The portly person filled her glass with chill amber. A waiter afterseveral trips about the table, and many helpless glances at Caroline, who was maintaining a cheerful, futile questionnaire as to thesucculence of this dish or that, managed to obtain the semblance of anorder and hurried away. . . . 

Olive was speaking to Merlin--

"When, then?" she asked, her voice faintly shaded with disappointment. He realized that he had just answered no to some question she hadasked him. 

"Oh, sometime. "

"Don't you--care?"

A rather pathetic poignancy in her question brought his eyes back toher. 

"As soon as possible, dear, " he replied with surprising tenderness. "In two months--in June. "

"So soon?" Her delightful excitement quite took her breath away. 

"Oh, yes, I think we'd better say June. No use waiting. "

Olive began to pretend that two months was really too short a time forher to make preparations. Wasn't he a bad boy! Wasn't he impatient, though! Well, she'd show him he mustn't be too quick with _her_. Indeed he was so sudden she didn't exactly know whether she ought tomarry him at all. 

"June, " he repeated sternly. 

Olive sighed and smiled and drank her coffee, her little finger liftedhigh above the others in true refined fashion. A stray thought came toMerlin that he would like to buy five rings and throw at it. 

"By gosh!" he exclaimed aloud. Soon he _would_ be putting ringson one of her fingers. 

His eyes swung sharply to the right. The party of four had become soriotous that the head-waiter had approached and spoken to them. Caroline was arguing with this head-waiter in a raised voice, a voiceso clear and young that it seemed as though the whole restaurant wouldlisten--the whole restaurant except Olive Masters, self-absorbed inher new secret. 

"How do you do?" Caroline was saying. "Probably the handsomesthead-waiter in captivity. Too much noise? Very unfortunate. Something'll have to be done about it. Gerald"--she addressed the manon her right--"the head-waiter says there's too much noise. Appeals tous to have it stopped. What'll I say?"

"Sh!" remonstrated Gerald, with laughter. "Sh!" and Merlin heard himadd in an undertone: "All the bourgeoisie will be aroused. This iswhere the floorwalkers learn French. "

Caroline sat up straight in sudden alertness. 

"Where's a floorwalker?" she cried. "Show me a floorwalker. " Thisseemed to amuse the party, for they all, including Caroline, burstinto renewed laughter. The head-waiter, after a last conscientious butdespairing admonition, became Gallic with his shoulders and retiredinto the background. 

Pulpat's, as every one knows, has the unvarying respectability of thetable d'hôte. It is not a gay place in the conventional sense. Onecomes, drinks the red wine, talks perhaps a little more and a littlelouder than usual under the low, smoky ceilings, and then goes home. It closes up at nine-thirty, tight as a drum; the policeman is paidoff and given an extra bottle of wine for the missis, the coat-roomgirl hands her tips to the collector, and then darkness crushes thelittle round tables out of sight and life. But excitement was preparedfor Pulpat's this evening--excitement of no mean variety. A girl withrusset, purple-shadowed hair mounted to her table-top and began todance thereon. 

"_Sacré nom de Dieu!_ Come down off there!" cried thehead-waiter. "Stop that music!"

But the musicians were already playing so loud that they could pretendnot to hear his order; having once been young, they played louder andgayer than ever, and Caroline danced with grace and vivacity, herpink, filmy dress swirling about her, her agile arms playing insupple, tenuous gestures along the smoky air. 

A group of Frenchmen at a table near by broke into cries of applause, in which other parties joined--in a moment the room was full ofclapping and shouting; half the diners were on their feet, crowdingup, and on the outskirts the hastily summoned proprietor was givingindistinct vocal evidences of his desire to put an end to this thingas quickly as possible. 

". . . Merlin!" cried Olive, awake, aroused at last; "she's such awicked girl! Let's get out--now!"

The fascinated Merlin protested feebly that the check was not paid. 

"It's all right. Lay five dollars on the table. I despise that girl. Ican't _bear_ to look at her. " She was on her feet now, tagging atMerlin's arm. 

Helplessly, listlessly, and then with what amounted to downrightunwillingness, Merlin rose, followed Olive dumbly as she picked herway through the delirious clamor, now approaching its height andthreatening to become a wild and memorable riot. Submissively he tookhis coat and stumbled up half a dozen steps into the moist April airoutside, his ears still ringing with the sound of light feet on thetable and of laughter all about and over the little world of the cafe. In silence they walked along toward Fifth Avenue and a bus, It was not until next day that she told him about the wedding--how shehad moved the date forward: it was much better that they should bemarried on the first of May. 

III

And married they were, in a somewhat stuffy manner, under thechandelier of the flat where Olive lived with her mother. Aftermarriage came elation, and then, gradually, the growth of weariness. Responsibility descended upon Merlin, the responsibility of making histhirty dollars a week and her twenty suffice to keep them respectablyfat and to hide with decent garments the evidence that they were. 

It was decided after several weeks of disastrous and well-nighhumiliating experiments with restaurants that they would join thegreat army of the delicatessen-fed, so he took up his old way of lifeagain, in that he stopped every evening at Braegdort's delicatessenand bought potatoes in salad, ham in slices, and sometimes evenstuffed tomatoes in bursts of extravagance. 

Then he would trudge homeward, enter the dark hallway, and climb threerickety flights of stairs covered by an ancient carpet of longobliterated design. The hall had an ancient smell--of the vegetablesof 1880, of the furniture polish in vogue when "Adam-and Eve" Bryanran against William McKinley, of portieres an ounce heavier with dust, from worn-out shoes, and lint from dresses turned long since intopatch-work quilts. This smell would pursue him up the stairs, revivified and made poignant at each landing by the aura ofcontemporary cooking, then, as he began the next flight, diminishinginto the odor of the dead routine of dead generations. 

Eventually would occur the door of his room, which slipped open withindecent willingness and closed with almost a sniff upon his "Hello, dear! Got a treat for you to-night. "

Olive, who always rode home on the bus to "get a morsel of air, " wouldbe making the bed and hanging up things. At his call she would come upto him and give him a quick kiss with wide-open eyes, while be heldher upright like a ladder, his hands on her two arms, as though shewere a thing without equilibrium, and would, once he relinquishedhold, fall stiffly backward to the floor. This is the kiss that comesin with the second year of marriage, succeeding the bridegroom kiss(which is rather stagey at best, say those who know about such things, and apt to be copied from passionate movies). 

Then came supper, and after that they went out for a walk, up twoblocks and through Central Park, or sometimes to a moving picture, which taught them patiently that they were the sort of people for whomlife was ordered, and that something very grand and brave andbeautiful would soon happen to them if they were docile and obedientto their rightful superiors and kept away from pleasure. 

Such was their day for three years. Then change came into their lives:Olive had a baby, and as a result Merlin had a new influx of materialresources. In the third week of Olive's confinement, after an hour ofnervous rehearsing, he went into the office of Mr. Moonlight Quill anddemanded an enormous increase in salary. 

"I've been here ten years, " he said; "since I was nineteen. I'vealways tried to do my best in the interests of the business. "

Mr. Moonlight Quill said that he would think it over. Next morning heannounced, to Merlin's great delight, that he was going to put intoeffect a project long premeditated--he was going to retire from activework in the bookshop, confining himself to periodic visits and leavingMerlin as manager with a salary of fifty dollars a week and aone-tenth interest in the business. When the old man finished, Merlin's cheeks were glowing and his eyes full of tears. He seized hisemployer's hand and shook it violently, saying over and over again:

"It's very nice of you, sir. It's very white of you. It's very, verynice of you. "

So after ten years of faithful work in the store he had won out atlast. Looking back, he saw his own progress toward this hill ofelation no longer as a sometimes sordid and always gray decade ofworry and failing enthusiasm and failing dreams, years when themoonlight had grown duller in the areaway and the youth had faded outof Olive's face, but as a glorious and triumphant climb over obstacleswhich he had determinedly surmounted by unconquerable will-power. Theoptimistic self-delusion that had kept him from misery was seen now inthe golden garments of stern resolution. Half a dozen times he hadtaken steps to leave the Moonlight Quill and soar upward, but throughsheer faintheartedness he had stayed on. Strangely enough he nowthought that those were times when he had exerted tremendouspersistence and had "determined" to fight it out where he was. 

At any rate, let us not for this moment begrudge Merlin his new andmagnificent view of himself. He had arrived. At thirty he had reacheda post of importance. He left the shop that evening fairly radiant, invested every penny in his pocket in the most tremendous feast thatBraegdort's delicatessen offered, and staggered homeward with thegreat news and four gigantic paper bags. The fact that Olive was toosick to eat, that he made himself faintly but unmistakably ill by astruggle with four stuffed tomatoes, and that most of the fooddeteriorated rapidly in an iceless ice-box: all next day did not marthe occasion. For the first time since the week of his marriage MerlinGrainger lived under a sky of unclouded tranquillity. 

The baby boy was christened Arthur, and life became dignified, significant, and, at length, centered. Merlin and Olive resignedthemselves to a somewhat secondary place in their own cosmos; but whatthey lost in personality they regained in a sort of primordial pride. The country house did not come, but a month in an Asbury Parkboarding-house each summer filled the gap; and during Merlin's twoweeks' holiday this excursion assumed the air of a really merryjaunt--especially when, with the baby asleep in a wide room openingtechnically on the sea, Merlin strolled with Olive along the throngedboard-walk puffing at his cigar and trying to look like twentythousand a year. 

With some alarm at the slowing up of the days and the accelerating ofthe years, Merlin became thirty-one, thirty-two--then almost with arush arrived at that age which, with all its washing and panning, canonly muster a bare handful of the precious stuff of youth: he becamethirty-five. And one day on Fifth Avenue he saw Caroline. 

It was Sunday, a radiant, flowerful Easter morning and the avenue wasa pageant of lilies and cutaways and happy April-colored bonnets. Twelve o'clock: the great churches were letting out their people--St. Simon's, St. Hilda's, the Church of the Epistles, opened their doorslike wide mouths until the people pouring forth surely resembled happylaughter as they met and strolled and chattered, or else waved whitebouquets at waiting chauffeurs. 

In front of the Church of the Epistles stood its twelve vestrymen, carrying out the time-honored custom of giving away Easter eggs fullof face-powder to the church-going debutantes of the year. Around themdelightedly danced the two thousand miraculously groomed children ofthe very rich, correctly cute and curled, shining like sparklinglittle jewels upon their mothers' fingers. Speaks the sentimentalistfor the children of the poor? Ah, but the children of the rich, laundered, sweet-smelling, complexioned of the country, and, aboveall, with soft, in-door voices. 

Little Arthur was five, child of the middle class. Undistinguished, unnoticed, with a nose that forever marred what Grecian yearnings hisfeatures might have had, he held tightly to his mother's warm, stickyhand, and, with Merlin on his other side, moved, upon the home-comingthrong. At Fifty-third Street, where there were two churches, thecongestion was at its thickest, its richest. Their progress was ofnecessity retarded to such an extent that even little Arthur had notthe slightest difficulty in keeping up. Then it was that Merlinperceived an open landaulet of deepest crimson, with handsome nickeltrimmings, glide slowly up to the curb and come to a stop. In it satCaroline. 

She was dressed in black, a tight-fitting gown trimmed with lavender, flowered at the waist with a corsage of orchids. Merlin started andthen gazed at her fearfully. For the first time in the eight yearssince his marriage he was encountering the girl again. But a girl nolonger. Her figure was slim as ever--or perhaps not quite, for acertain boyish swagger, a sort of insolent adolescence, had gone theway of the first blooming of her cheeks. But she was beautiful;dignity was there now, and the charming lines of a fortuitousnine-and-twenty; and she sat in the car with such perfectappropriateness and self-possession that it made him breathless towatch her. 

Suddenly she smiled--the smile of old, bright as that very Easter andits flowers, mellower than ever--yet somehow with not quite theradiance and infinite promise of that first smile back there in thebookshop nine years before. It was a steelier smile, disillusioned andsad. 

But it was soft enough and smile enough to make a pair of young men incutaway coats hurry over, to pull their high hats off their wetted, iridescent hair; to bring them, flustered and bowing, to the edge ofher landaulet, where her lavender gloves gently touched their grayones. And these two were presently joined by another, and then twomore, until there was a rapidly swelling crowd around the landaulet. Merlin would hear a young man beside him say to his perhapswell-favored companion:

"If you'll just pardon me a moment, there's some one I _have_ tospeak to. Walk right ahead. I'll catch up. "

Within three minutes every inch of the landaulet, front, back, andside, was occupied by a man--a man trying to construct a sentenceclever enough to find its way to Caroline through the stream ofconversation. Luckily for Merlin a portion of little Arthur's clothinghad chosen the opportunity to threaten a collapse, and Olive hadhurriedly rushed him over against a building for some extemporaneousrepair work, so Merlin was able to watch, unhindered, the salon in thestreet. 

The crowd swelled. A row formed in back of the first, two more behind that. In the midst, an orchid rising from a blackbouquet, sat Caroline enthroned in her obliterated car, nodding andcrying salutations and smiling with such true happiness that, of asudden, a new relay of gentlemen had left their wives and consorts andwere striding toward her. 

The crowd, now phalanx deep, began to be augmented by the merelycurious; men of all ages who could not possibly have known Carolinejostled over and melted into the circle of ever-increasing diameter, until the lady in lavender was the centre of a vast impromptuauditorium. 

All about her were faces--clean-shaven, bewhiskered, old, young, ageless, and now, here and there, a woman. The mass was rapidlyspreading to the opposite curb, and, as St. Anthony's around thecorner let out its box-holders, it overflowed to the sidewalk andcrushed up against the iron picket-fence of a millionaire across thestreet. The motors speeding along the avenue were compelled to stop, and in a jiffy were piled three, five, and six deep at the edge of thecrowd; auto-busses, top-heavy turtles of traffic, plunged into thejam, their passengers crowding to the edges of the roofs in wildexcitement and peering down into the centre of the mass, whichpresently could hardly be seen from the mass's edge. 

The crush had become terrific. No fashionable audience at aYale-Princeton football game, no damp mob at a world's series, couldbe compared with the panoply that talked, stared, laughed, and honkedabout the lady in black and lavender. It was stupendous; it wasterrible. A quarter mile down the block a half-frantic policemancalled his precinct; on the same corner a frightened civilian crashedin the glass of a fire-alarm and sent in a wild paean for all thefire-engines of the city; up in an apartment high in one of the tallbuildings a hysterical old maid telephoned in turn for the prohibitionenforcement agent; the special deputies on Bolshevism, and thematernity ward of Bellevue Hospital. 

The noise increased. The first fire-engine arrived, filling the Sundayair with smoke, clanging and crying a brazen, metallic message downthe high, resounding walls. In the notion that some terrible calamityhad overtaken the city, two excited deacons ordered special servicesimmediately and set tolling the great bells of St. Hilda's and St. Anthony's, presently joined by the jealous gongs of St. Simon's andthe Church of the Epistles. Even far off in the Hudson and the EastRiver the sounds of the commotion were heard, and the ferry-boats andtugs and ocean liners set up sirens and whistles that sailed inmelancholy cadence, now varied, now reiterated, across the wholediagonal width of the city from Riverside Drive to the graywater-fronts of the lower East Side. . . . 

In the centre of her landaulet sat the lady in black and lavender, chatting pleasantly first with one, then with another of thatfortunate few in cutaways who had found their way to speaking distancein the first rush. After a while she glanced around her and beside herwith a look of growing annoyance. 

She yawned and asked the man nearest her if he couldn't run insomewhere and get her a glass of water. The man apologized in someembarrassment. He could not have moved hand or foot. He could not havescratched his own ear. . . . 

As the first blast of the river sirens keened along the air, Olivefastened the last safety-pin in little Arthur's rompers and looked up. Merlin saw her start, stiffen slowly like hardening stucco, and thengive a little gasp of surprise and disapproval. 

"That woman, " she cried suddenly. "Oh!"

She flashed a glance at Merlin that mingled reproach and pain, andwithout another word gathered up little Arthur with one hand, graspedher husband by the other, and darted amazingly in a winding, bumpingcanter through the crowd. Somehow people gave way before her; somehowshe managed to-retain her grasp on her son and husband; somehow shemanaged to emerge two blocks up, battered and dishevelled, into anopen space, and, without slowing up her pace, darted down aside-street. Then at last, when uproar had died away into a dim anddistant clamor, did she come to a walk and set little Arthur upon hisfeet. 

"And on Sunday, too! Hasn't she disgraced herself enough?" This washer only comment. She said it to Arthur, as she seemed to address herremarks to Arthur throughout the remainder of the day. For somecurious and esoteric reason she had never once looked at her husbandduring the entire retreat. 

IV

The years between thirty-five and sixty-five revolve before thepassive mind as one unexplained, confusing merry-go-round. True, theyare a merry-go-round of ill-gaited and wind-broken horses, paintedfirst in pastel colors, then in dull grays and browns, but perplexingand intolerably dizzy the thing is, as never were the merry-go-roundsof childhood or adolescence; as never, surely, were thecertain-coursed, dynamic roller-coasters of youth. For most men andwomen these thirty years are taken up with a gradual withdrawal fromlife, a retreat first from a front with many shelters, those myriadamusements and curiosities of youth, to a line with less, when we peeldown our ambitions to one ambition, our recreations to one recreation, our friends to a few to whom we are anaesthetic; ending up at last ina solitary, desolate strong point that is not strong, where the shellsnow whistle abominably, now are but half-heard as, by turns frightenedand tired, we sit waiting for death. 

At forty, then, Merlin was no different from himself at thirty-five; alarger paunch, a gray twinkling near his ears, a more certain lack ofvivacity in his walk. His forty-five differed from his forty by a likemargin, unless one mention a slight deafness in his left ear. But atfifty-five the process had become a chemical change of immenserapidity. Yearly he was more and more an "old man" to hisfamily--senile almost, so far as his wife was concerned. He was bythis time complete owner of the bookshop. The mysterious Mr. MoonlightQuill, dead some five years and not survived by his wife, had deededthe whole stock and store to him, and there he still spent his days, conversant now by name with almost all that man has recorded for threethousand years, a human catalogue, an authority upon tooling andbinding, upon folios and first editions, an accurate inventory of athousand authors whom he could never have understood and had certainlynever read. 

At sixty-five he distinctly doddered. He had assumed the melancholyhabits of the aged so often portrayed by the second old man instandard Victorian comedies. He consumed vast warehouses of timesearching for mislaid spectacles. He "nagged" his wife and was naggedin turn. He told the same jokes three or four times a year at thefamily table, and gave his son weird, impossible directions as to hisconduct in life. Mentally and materially he was so entirely differentfrom the Merlin Grainger of twenty-five that it seemed incongruousthat he should bear the same name. 

He worked still In the bookshop with the assistance of a youth, whom, of course, he considered very idle, indeed, and a new young woman, Miss Gaffney. Miss McCracken, ancient and unvenerable as himself, still kept the accounts. Young Arthur was gone into Wall Street tosell bonds, as all the young men seemed to be doing in that day. This, of course, was as it should be. Let old Merlin get what magic he couldfrom his books--the place of young King Arthur was in thecounting-house. 

One afternoon at four when he had slipped noiselessly up to the frontof the store on his soft-soled slippers, led by a newly formed habit, of which, to be fair, he was rather ashamed, of spying upon the youngman clerk, he looked casually out of the front window, straining hisfaded eyesight to reach the street. A limousine, large, portentous, impressive, had drawn to the curb, and the chauffeur, afterdismounting and holding some sort of conversation with persons in theinterior of the car, turned about and advanced in a bewildered fashiontoward the entrance of the Moonlight Quill. He opened the door, shuffled in, and, glancing uncertainly at the old man in theskull-cap, addressed him in a thick, murky voice, as though his wordscame through a fog. 

"Do you--do you sell additions?"

Merlin nodded. 

"The arithmetic books are in the back of the store. "

The chauffeur took off his cap and scratched a close-cropped, fuzzyhead. 

"Oh, naw. This I want's a detecatif story. " He jerked a thumb backtoward the limousine. "She seen it in the paper. Firs' addition. "

Merlin's interest quickened. Here was possibly a big sale. 

"Oh, editions. Yes, we've advertised some firsts, but-detectivestories, I-don't-believe-What was the title?"

"I forget. About a crime. "

"About a crime. I have-well, I have 'The Crimes of the Borgias'-fullmorocco, London 1769, beautifully--"

"Naw, " interrupted the chauffeur, "this was one fella did this crime. She seen you had it for sale in the paper. " He rejected severalpossible titles with the air of connoisseur. 

"'Silver Bones, '" he announced suddenly out of a slight pause. 

"What?" demanded Merlin, suspecting that the stiffness of his sinewswere being commented on. 

"Silver Bones. That was the guy that done the crime. "

"Silver Bones?"

"Silver Bones. Indian, maybe. "

Merlin, stroked his grizzly cheeks. "Gees, Mister, " went on theprospective purchaser, "if you wanna save me an awful bawln' out jes'try an' think. The old lady goes wile if everything don't run smooth. "

But Merlin's musings on the subject of Silver Bones were as futile ashis obliging search through the shelves, and five minutes later a verydejected charioteer wound his way back to his mistress. Through theglass Merlin could see the visible symbols of a tremendous uproargoing on in the interior of the limousine. The chauffeur made wild, appealing gestures of his innocence, evidently to no avail, for whenhe turned around and climbed back into the driver's seat hisexpression was not a little dejected. 

Then the door of the limousine opened and gave forth a pale andslender young man of about twenty, dressed in the attenuation offashion and carrying a wisp of a cane. He entered the shop, walkedpast Merlin, and proceeded to take out a cigarette and light it. Merlin approached him. 

"Anything I can do for you, sir?"

"Old boy, " said the youth coolly, "there are seveereal things; You canfirst let me smoke my ciggy in here out of sight of that old lady inthe limousine, who happens to be my grandmother. Her knowledge as towhether I smoke it or not before my majority happens to be a matter offive thousand dollars to me. The second thing is that you should lookup your first edition of the 'Crime of Sylvester Bonnard' that youadvertised in last Sunday's _Times_. My grandmother there happensto want to take it off your hands. "

Detecatif story! Crime of somebody! Silver Bones! All was explained. With a faint deprecatory chuckle, as if to say that he would haveenjoyed this had life put him in the habit of enjoying anything, Merlin doddered away to the back of his shop where his treasures werekept, to get this latest investment which he had picked up rathercheaply at the sale of a big collection. 

When he returned with it the young man was drawing on his cigaretteand blowing out quantities of smoke with immense satisfaction. 

"My God!" he said, "She keeps me so close to her the entire dayrunning idiotic errands that this happens to be my first puff in sixhours. What's the world coming to, I ask you, when a feeble old ladyin the milk-toast era can dictate to a man as to his personal vices. Ihappen to be unwilling to be so dictated to. Let's see the book. "

Merlin passed it to him tenderly and the young man, after opening itwith a carelessness that gave a momentary jump to the book-dealer'sheart, ran through the pages with his thumb. 

"No illustrations, eh?" he commented. "Well, old boy, what's it worth?Speak up! We're willing to give you a fair price, though why I don'tknow. "

"One hundred dollars, " said Merlin with a frown. 

The young man gave a startled whistle. 

"Whew! Come on. You're not dealing with somebody from the cornbelt. Ihappen to be a city-bred man and my grandmother happens to be acity-bred woman, though I'll admit it'd take a special taxappropriation to keep her in repair. We'll give you twenty-fivedollars, and let me tell you that's liberal. We've got books in ourattic, up in our attic with my old play-things, that were writtenbefore the old boy that wrote this was born. "

Merlin stiffened, expressing a rigid and meticulous horror. 

"Did your grandmother give you twenty-five dollars to buy this with?"

"She did not. She gave me fifty, but she expects change. I know thatold lady. "

"You tell her, " said Merlin with dignity, "that she has missed a verygreat bargain. "

"Give you forty, " urged the young man. "Come on now--be reasonable anddon't try to hold us up----"

Merlin had wheeled around with the precious volume under his arm andwas about to return it to its special drawer in his office when therewas a sudden interruption. With unheard-of magnificence the front doorburst rather than swung open, and admitted in the dark interior aregal apparition in black silk and fur which bore rapidly down uponhim. The cigarette leaped from the fingers of the urban young man andhe gave breath to an inadvertent "Damn!"--but it was upon Merlin thatthe entrance seemed to have the most remarkable and incongruouseffect--so strong an effect that the greatest treasure of his shopslipped from his hand and joined the cigarette on the floor. Beforehim stood Caroline. 

She was an old woman, an old woman remarkably preserved, unusuallyhandsome, unusually erect, but still an old woman. Her hair was asoft, beautiful white, elaborately dressed and jewelled; her face, faintly rouged à la grande dame, showed webs of wrinkles at the edgesof her eyes and two deeper lines in the form of stanchions connectedher nose with the corners of her mouth. Her eyes were dim, illnatured, and querulous. 

But it was Caroline without a doubt: Caroline's features though indecay; Caroline's figure, if brittle and stiff in movement; Caroline'smanner, unmistakably compounded of a delightful insolence and anenviable self assurance; and, most of all, Caroline's voice, brokenand shaky, yet with a ring in it that still could and did makechauffeurs want to drive laundry wagons and cause cigarettes to fallfrom the fingers of urban grandsons. 

She stood and sniffed. Her eyes found the cigarette upon the floor. 

"What's that?" she cried. The words were not a question--they were anentire litany of suspicion, accusation, confirmation, and decision. She tarried over them scarcely an instant. "Stand up!" she said to hergrandson, "stand up and blow that nicotine out of your lungs!"

The young man looked at her in trepidation. 

"Blow!" she commanded. 

He pursed his lips feebly and blew into the air. 

"Blow!" she repeated, more peremptorily than before. 

He blew again, helplessly, ridiculously. 

"Do you realize, " she went on briskly, "that you've forfeited fivethousand dollars in five minutes?"

Merlin momentarily expected the young man to fall pleading upon hisknees, but such is the nobility of human nature that he remainedstanding--even blew again into the air, partly from nervousness, partly, no doubt, with some vague hope of reingratiating himself. 

"Young ass!" cried Caroline. "Once more, just once more and you leavecollege and go to work. "

This threat had such an overwhelming effect upon the young man that hetook on an even paler pallor than was natural to him. But Caroline wasnot through. 

"Do you think I don't know what you and your brothers, yes, and yourasinine father too, think of me? Well, I do. You think I'm senile. Youthink I'm soft. I'm not!" She struck herself with her-fist as thoughto prove that she was a mass of muscle and sinew. "And I'll have morebrains left when you've got me laid out in the drawing-room some sunnyday than you and the rest of them were born with. "

"But Grandmother----"

"Be quiet. You, a thin little stick of a boy, who if it weren't for mymoney might have risen to be a journeyman barber out in the Bronx--Letme see your hands. Ugh! The hands of a barber--_you_ presume tobe smart with _me_, who once had three counts and a bona-fideduke, not to mention half a dozen papal titles pursue me from the cityof Rome to the city of New York. " She paused, took breath. "Stand up!Blow'!"

The young man obediently blew. Simultaneously the door opened and anexcited gentleman of middle age who wore a coat and hat trimmed withfur, and seemed, moreover, to be trimmed with the same sort of furhimself on upper lip and chin, rushed into the store and up toCaroline. 

"Found you at last, " he cried. "Been looking for you all over town. Tried your house on the 'phone and your secretary told me he thoughtyou'd gone to a bookshop called the Moonlight--"

Caroline turned to him irritably. 

"Do I employ you for your reminiscences?" she snapped. "Are you mytutor or my broker?"

"Your broker, " confessed the fur-trimmed man, taken somewhat aback. "Ibeg your pardon. I came about that phonograph stock. I can sell for ahundred and five. "

"Then do it"

"Very well. I thought I'd better--"

"Go sell it. I'm talking to my grandson. "

"Very well. I--"

"Good-by. "

"Good-by, Madame. " The fur-trimmed man made a slight bow and hurriedin some confusion from the shop. 

"As for you, " said Caroline, turning to her grandson, "you stay justwhere you are and be quiet. "

She turned to Merlin and included his entire length in a notunfriendly survey. Then she smiled and he found himself smiling too. In an instant they had both broken into a cracked but none the lessspontaneous chuckle. She seized his arm and hurried him to the otherside of the store. There they stopped, faced each other, and gave ventto another long fit of senile glee. 

"It's the only way, " she gasped in a sort of triumphant malignity. "The only thing that keeps old folks like me happy is the sense thatthey can make other people step around. To be old and rich and havepoor descendants is almost as much fun as to be young and beautifuland have ugly sisters. "

"Oh, yes, " chuckled Merlin. "I know. I envy you. "

She nodded, blinking. 

"The last time I was in here, forty years ago, " she said, "you were ayoung man very anxious to kick up your heels. "

"I was, " he confessed. 

"My visit must have meant a good deal to you. "

"You have all along, " he exclaimed. "I thought--I used to think atfirst that you were a real person--human, I mean. "

She laughed. 

"Many men have thought me inhuman. "

"But now, " continued Merlin excitedly, "I understand. Understanding isallowed to us old people--after nothing much matters. I see now thaton a certain night when you danced upon a table-top you were nothingbut my romantic yearning for a beautiful and perverse woman. "

Her old eyes were far away, her voice no more than the echo of aforgotten dream. 

"How I danced that night! I remember. "

"You were making an attempt at me. Olive's arms were closing about meand you warned me to be free and keep my measure of youth andirresponsibility. But it seemed like an effect gotten up at the lastmoment. It came too late. "

"You are very old, " she said inscrutably. "I did not realize. "

"Also I have not forgotten what you did to me when I was thirty-five. You shook me with that traffic tie-up. It was a magnificent effort. The beauty and power you radiated! You became personified even to mywife, and she feared you. For weeks I wanted to slip out of the houseat dark and forget the stuffiness of life with music and cocktails anda girl to make me young. But then--I no longer knew how. "

"And now you are so very old. "

With a sort of awe she moved back and away from him. 

"Yes, leave me!" he cried. "You are old also; the spirit withers withthe skin. Have you come here only to tell me something I had bestforget: that to be old and poor is perhaps more wretched than to beold and rich; to remind me that _my_ son hurls my gray failure inmy face?"

"Give me my book, " she commanded harshly. "Be quick, old man!"

Merlin looked at her once more and then patiently obeyed. He picked upthe book and handed it to her, shaking his head when she offered him abill. 

"Why go through the farce of paying me? Once you made me wreck thesevery premises. "

"I did, " she said in anger, "and I'm glad. Perhaps there had beenenough done to ruin _me_. "

She gave him a glance, half disdain, half ill-concealed uneasiness, and with a brisk word to her urban grandson moved toward the door. 

Then she was gone--out of his shop--out of his life. The door clicked. With a sigh he turned and walked brokenly back toward the glasspartition that enclosed the yellowed accounts of many years as well asthe mellowed, wrinkled Miss McCracken. 

Merlin regarded her parched, cobwebbed face with an odd sort of pity. She, at any rate, had had less from life than he. No rebellious, romantic spirit popping out unbidden had, in its memorable moments, given her life a zest and a glory. 

Then Miss McGracken looked up and spoke to him:

"Still a spunky old piece, isn't she?"

Merlin started. 

"Who?"

"Old Alicia Dare. Mrs. Thomas Allerdyce she is now, of course; hasbeen, these thirty years. "

"What? I don't understand you. " Merlin sat down suddenly in his swivelchair; his eyes were wide. 

"Why, surely, Mr. Grainger, you can't tell me that you've forgottenher, when for ten years she was the most notorious character in NewYork. Why, one time when she was the correspondent in the Throckmortondivorce case she attracted so much attention on Fifth Avenue thatthere was a traffic tie-up. Didn't you read about it in the papers. "

"I never used to read the papers. " His ancient brain was whirring. 

"Well, you can't have forgotten the time she came in here and ruinedthe business. Let me tell you I came near asking Mr. Moonlight Quillfor my salary, and clearing out. "

"Do you mean, that--that you _saw_ her?"

"Saw. Her! How could I help, it with the racket that went on. Heavenknows Mr. Moonlight Quill didn't like it either but of course _he_didn't say anything. He was daffy about her and she could twist himaround her little finger. The second he opposed one of her whims she'dthreaten to tell his wife on him. Served him right. The idea of thatman falling for a pretty adventuress! Of course he was never richenough for _her_ even though the shop paid well in those days. "

"But when I saw her. " stammered Merlin, "that is, when I_thought_ saw her, she lived with her mother. "

"Mother, trash!". Said Miss McCracken indignantly. "She had a womanthere she called 'Aunty', who was no more related to her than I am. Oh, she was a bad one--but clever. Right after the Throckmortondivorce case she married Thomas Allerdyce, and made herself secure forlife. "

"Who was she?" cried Merlin. "For God's sake what was she--a witch?"

"Why, she was Alicia Dare, the dancer, of course. In those days youcouldn't pick up a paper without finding her picture. "

Merlin sat very quiet, his brain suddenly fatigued and stilled. He wasan old man now indeed, so old that it was impossible for him to dreamof ever having been young, so old that the glamour was gone out of theworld, passing not into the faces of children and into the persistentcomforts of warmth and life, but passing out of the range of sight andfeeling. He was never to smile again or to sit in a long reverie whenspring evenings wafted the cries of children in at his window untilgradually they became the friends of his boyhood out there, urging himto come and play before the last dark came down. He was too old noweven for memories. 

That night he sat at supper with his wife and son, who had used himfor their blind purposes. Olive said:

"Don't sit there like a death's-head. Say something. "

"Let him sit quiet, " growled Arthur. "If you encourage him he'll tellus a story we've heard a hundred times before. "

Merlin went up-stairs very quietly at nine o'clock. When he was in hisroom and had closed the door tight he stood by it for a moment, histhin limbs trembling. He knew now that he had always been a fool. 

"O Russet Witch!"

But it was too late. He had angered Providence by resisting too manytemptations. There was nothing left but heaven, where he would meetonly those who, like him, had wasted earth. 

UNCLASSIFIED MASTERPIECES

THE LEES OF HAPPINESS

If you should look through the files of old magazines for the firstyears of the present century you would find, sandwiched in between thestories of Richard Harding Davis and Frank Norris and others longsince dead, the work of one Jeffrey Curtain: a novel or two, andperhaps three or four dozen short stories. You could, if you wereinterested, follow them along until, say, 1908, when they suddenlydisappeared. 

When you had read them all you would have been quite sure that herewere no masterpieces--here were passably amusing stories, a bit out ofdate now, but doubtless the sort that would then have whiled away adreary half hour in a dental office. The man who did them was of goodintelligence, talented, glib, probably young. In the samples of hiswork you found there would have been nothing to stir you to more thana faint interest in the whims of life--no deep interior laughs, nosense of futility or hint of tragedy. 

After reading them you would yawn and put the number back in thefiles, and perhaps, if you were in some library reading-room, youwould decide that by way of variety you would look at a newspaper ofthe period and see whether the Japs had taken Port Arthur. But if byany chance the newspaper you had chosen was the right one and hadcrackled open at the theatrical page, your eyes would have beenarrested and held, and for at least a minute you would have forgottenPort Arthur as quickly as you forgot Château Thierry. For you would, by this fortunate chance, be looking at the portrait of an exquisitewoman. 

Those were tie days of "Florodora" and of sextets, of pinched-inwaists and blown-out sleeves, of almost bustles and absolute balletskirts, but here, without doubt, disguised as she might be by theunaccustomed stiffness and old fashion of her costume, was a butterflyof butterflies. Here was the gayety of the period--the soft wine ofeyes, the songs that flurried hearts, the toasts and tie bouquets, thedances and the dinners. Here was a Venus of the hansom, cab, theGibson girl in her glorious prime. Here was. . . 

. . . Here was you. Find by looking at the name beneath, one RoxanneMilbank, who had been chorus girl and understudy in "The Daisy Chain, "but who, by reason of an excellent performance when the star wasindisposed, had gained a leading part. 

You would look again--and wonder. Why you had never heard of her. Whydid her name not linger in popular songs and vaudeville jokes andcigar bands, and the memory of that gay old uncle of yours along withLillian Russell and Stella Mayhew and Anna Held? RoxanneMilbank-whither had she gone? What dark trap-door had opened suddenlyand swallowed her up? Her name was certainly not in last Sunday'ssupplement on the list of actresses married to English noblemen. Nodoubt she was dead--poor beautiful young lady--and quite forgotten. 

I am hoping too much. I am having you stumble on Jeffrey Curtains'sstories and Roxanne Milbank's picture. It would be incredible that youshould find a newspaper item six months later, a single item twoinches by four, which informed the public of the marriage, veryquietly, of Miss Roxanne Milbank, who had been on tour with "The DaisyChain, " to Mr. Jeffrey Curtain, the popular author. "Mrs. Curtain, " itadded dispassionately, "will retire from the stage. "

It was a marriage of love. He was sufficiently spoiled to be charming;she was ingenuous enough to be irresistible. Like two floating logsthey met in a head-on rush, caught, and sped along together. Yet hadJeffrey Curtain kept at scrivening for twoscore years he could nothave put a quirk into one of his stories weirder than the quirk thatcame into his own life. Had Roxanne Milbank played three dozen partsand filled five thousand houses she could never have had a role withmore happiness and more despair than were in the fate prepared forRoxanne Curtain. 

For a year they lived in hotels, travelled to California, to Alaska, to Florida, to Mexico, loved and quarrelled gently, and gloried in thegolden triflings of his wit with her beauty--they were young andgravely passionate; they demanded everything and then yieldedeverything again in ecstasies of unselfishness and pride. She lovedthe swift tones of his voice and his frantic, if unfounded jealousy. He loved her dark radiance, the white irises of her eyes, the warm, lustrous enthusiasm of her smile. 

"Don't you like her?" he would demand rather excitedly and shyly. "Isn't she wonderful? Did you ever see--"

"Yes, " they would answer, grinning. "She's a wonder. You're lucky. "

The year passed. They tired of hotels. They bought an old house andtwenty acres near the town of Marlowe, half an hour from Chicago;bought a little car, and moved out riotously with a pioneeringhallucination that would have confounded Balboa. 

"Your room will be here!" they cried in turn. 

--And then:

"And my room here!"

"And the nursery here when we have children. "

"And we'll build a sleeping porch--oh, next year. "

They moved out in April. In July Jeffrey's closest friend, HarryCromwell same to spend a week--they met him at the end of the longlawn and hurried him proudly to the house. 

Harry was married also. His wife had had a baby some six months beforeand was still recuperating at her mother's in New York. Roxanne hadgathered from Jeffrey that Harry's wife was not as attractive asHarry--Jeffrey had met her once and considered her--"shallow. " ButHarry had been married nearly two years and was apparantly happy, soJeffrey guessed that she was probably all right. 

"I'm making biscuits, " chattered Roxanne gravely. "Can you wife makebiscuits? The cook is showing me how. I think every woman should knowhow to make biscuits. It sounds so utterly disarming. A woman who canmake biscuits can surely do no----"

"You'll have to come out here and live, " said Jeffrey. "Get a placeout in the country like us, for you and Kitty. "

"You don't know Kitty. She hates the country. She's got to have hertheatres and vaudevilles. "

"Bring her out, " repeated Jeffrey. "We'll have a colony. There's anawfully nice crowd here already. Bring her out!"

They were at the porch steps now and Roxanne made a brisk gesturetoward a dilapidated structure on the right. 

"The garage, " she announced. "It will also be Jeffrey's writing-roomwithin the month. Meanwhile dinner is at seven. Meanwhile to that Iwill mix a cocktail. "

The two men ascended to the second floor--that is, they ascendedhalf-way, for at the first landing Jeffrey dropped his guest'ssuitcase and in a cross between a query and a cry exclaimed:

"For God's sake, Harry, how do you like her?"

"We will go up-stairs, " answered his guest, "and we will shut thedoor. "

Half an hour later as they were sitting together in the libraryRoxanne reissued from the kitchen, bearing before her a pan ofbiscuits. Jeffrey and Harry rose. 

"They're beautiful, dear, " said the husband, intensely. 

"Exquisite, " murmured Harry. 

Roxanne beamed. 

"Taste one. I couldn't bear to touch them before you'd seen them alland I can't bear to take them back until I find what they taste like. "

"Like manna, darling. "

Simultaneously the two men raised the biscuits to their lips, nibbledtentatively. Simultaneously they tried to change the subject. ButRoxanne undeceived, set down the pan and seized a biscuit. After asecond her comment rang out with lugubrious finality:

"Absolutely bum!"

"Really----"

"Why, I didn't notice----"

Roxanne roared. 

"Oh, I'm useless, " she cried laughing. "Turn me out, Jeffrey--I'm aparasite; I'm no goal----"

Jeffrey put his arm around her. 

"Darling, I'll eat your biscuits. "

"They're beautiful, anyway, " insisted Roxanne. 

"They're-they're decorative, " suggested Harry. 

Jeffrey took him up wildly. 

"That's the word. They're decorative; they're masterpieces. We'll usethem. "

He rushed to the kitchen and returned with a hammer and a handful ofnails. 

"We'll use them, by golly, Roxanne! We'll make a frieze out of them. "

"Don't!" wailed Roxanne. "Our beautiful house. "

"Never mind. We're going to have the library repapered in October. Don't you remember?"

"Well----"

Bang! The first biscuit was impaled to the wall, where it quivered fora moment like a live thing. 

Bang!. . . 

When Roxanne returned, with a second round of cocktails the biscuitswere in a perpendicular row, twelve of them, like a collection ofprimitive spear-heads. 

"Roxanne, " exclaimed Jeffrey, "you're an artist! Cook?--nonsense! Youshall illustrate my books!"

During dinner the twilight faltered into dusk, and later it was astarry dark outside, filled and permeated with the frail gorgeousnessof Roxanne's white dress and her tremulous, low laugh. 

--Such a little girl she is, thought Harry. Not as old as Kitty. 

He compared the two. Kitty--nervous without being sensitive, temperamental without temperament, a woman who seemed to flit andnever light--and Roxanne, who was as young as spring night, and summedup in her own adolescent laughter. 

--A good match for Jeffrey, he thought again. Two very young people, the sort who'll stay very young until they suddenly find themselvesold. 

Harry thought these things between his constant thoughts about Kitty, He was depressed about Kitty. It seemed to him that she was wellenough to come back to Chicago and bring his little son. He wasthinking vaguely of Kitty when he said good-night to his friend's wifeand his friend at the foot of the stairs. 

"You're our first real house guest, " called Roxanne after him. "Aren'tyou thrilled and proud?"

When he was out of sight around the stair corner she turned toJeffrey, who was standing beside her resting his hand on the end ofthe banister. 

"Are you tired, my dearest?"

Jeffrey rubbed the centre of his forehead with his fingers. 

"A little. How did you know?"

"Oh, how could I help knowing about you?"

"It's a headache, " he said moodily. "Splitting. I'll take someaspirin. "

She reached over and snapped out the light, and with his arm tightabout her waist they walked up the stairs together. 

II

Harry's week passed. They drove about the dreaming lanes or idled incheerful inanity upon lake or lawn. In the evening Roxanne, sittinginside, played to them while the ashes whitened on the glowing ends oftheir cigars. Then came a telegram from Kitty saying that she wantedHarry to come East and get her, so Roxanne and Jeffrey were left alonein that privacy of which they never seemed to tire. 

"Alone" thrilled them again. They wandered about the house, eachfeeling intimately the presence of the other; they sat on the sameside of the table like honeymooners; they were intensely absorbed, intensely happy. 

The town of Marlowe, though a comparatively old settlement, had onlyrecently acquired a "society. " Five or six years before, alarmed atthe smoky swelling of Chicago, two or three young married couples, "bungalow people, " had moved out; their friends had followed. TheJeffrey Curtains found an already formed "set" prepared to welcome:them; a country club, ballroom, and golf links yawned for them, andthere were bridge parties, and poker parties, and parties where theydrank beer, and parties where they drank nothing at all. 

It was at a poker party that they found themselves a week afterHarry's departure. There were two tables, and a good proportion of theyoung wives were smoking and shouting their bets, and being verydaringly mannish for those days. 

Roxanne had left the game early and taken to perambulation; shewandered into the pantry and found herself some grape juice--beer gaveher a headache--and then passed from table to table, looking overshoulders at the hands, keeping an eye on Jeffrey and being pleasantlyunexcited and content. Jeffrey, with intense concentration, wasraising a pile of chips of all colors, and Roxanne knew by thedeepened wrinkle between his eyes that he was interested. She liked tosee him interested in small things. 

She crossed over quietly and sat down on the arm of his chair. 

She sat there five minutes, listening to the sharp intermittentcomments of the men and the chatter of the women, which rose from thetable like soft smoke--and yet scarcely hearing either. Then quiteinnocently she reached out her hand, intending to place it onJeffrey's shoulder--as it touched him he started of a sudden, gave ashort grunt, and, sweeping back his arm furiously, caught her aglancing blow on her elbow. 

There was a general gasp. Roxanne regained her balance, gave a littlecry, and rose quickly to her feet. It had been the greatest shock ofher life. This, from Jeffrey, the heart of kindness, ofconsideration--this instinctively brutal gesture. 

The gasp became a silence. A dozen eyes were turned on Jeffrey, wholooked up as though seeing Roxanne for the first time. An expressionof bewilderment settled on his face. 

"Why--Roxanne----" he said haltingly. 

Into a dozen minds entered a quick suspicion, a rumor of scandal. Could it be that behind the scenes with this couple, apparently so inlove, lurked some curious antipathy? Why else this streak of fire, across such a cloudless heaven?

"Jeffrey!"--Roxanne's voice was pleading--startled and horrified, sheyet knew that it was a mistake. Not once did it occur to her to blamehim or to resent it. Her word was a trembling supplication--"Tell me, Jeffrey, " it said, "tell Roxanne, your own Roxanne. "

"Why, Roxanne--" began Jeffrey again. The bewildered look changed topain. He was clearly as startled as she. "I didn't intend that, " hewent on; "you startled me. You--I felt as if some one were attackingme. I--how--why, how idiotic!"

"Jeffrey!" Again the word was a prayer, incense offered up to a highGod through this new and unfathomable darkness. 

They were both on their feet, they were saying good-by, faltering, apologizing, explaining. There was no attempt to pass it off easily. That way lay sacrilege. Jeffrey had not been feeling well, they said. He had become nervous. Back of both their minds was the unexplainedhorror of that blow--the marvel that there had been for an instantsomething between them--his anger and her fear--and now to both asorrow, momentary, no doubt, but to be bridged at once, at once, whilethere was yet time. Was that swift water lashing under their feet--thefierce glint of some uncharted chasm?

Out in their car under the harvest moon he talked brokenly. It wasjust--incomprehensible to him, he said. He had been thinking of thepoker game--absorbed--and the touch on his shoulder had seemed like anattack. An attack! He clung to that word, flung it up as a shield. Hehad hated what touched him. With the impact of his hand it had gone, that--nervousness. That was all he knew. 

Both their eyes filled with tears and they whispered love there underthe broad night as the serene streets of Marlowe sped by. Later, whenthey went to bed, they were quite calm. Jeffrey was to take a week offall work--was simply to loll, and sleep, and go on long walks untilthis nervousness left him. When they had decided this safety settleddown upon Roxanne. The pillows underhead became soft and friendly; thebed on which they lay seemed wide, and white, and sturdy beneath theradiance that streamed in at the window. 

Five days later, in the first cool of late afternoon, Jeffrey pickedup an oak chair and sent it crashing through his own front window. Then he lay down on the couch like a child, weeping piteously andbegging to die. A blood clot the size of a marble had broken hisbrain. 

III

There is a sort of waking nightmare that sets in sometimes when onehas missed a sleep or two, a feeling that comes with extreme fatigueand a new sun, that the quality of the life around has changed. It isa fully articulate conviction that somehow the existence one is thenleading is a branch shoot of life and is related to life only as amoving picture or a mirror--that the people, and streets, and housesare only projections from a very dim and chaotic past. It was in sucha state that Roxanne found herself during the first months ofJeffrey's illness. She slept only when she was utterly exhausted; sheawoke under a cloud. The long, sober-voiced consultations, the faintaura of medicine in the halls, the sudden tiptoeing in a house thathad echoed to many cheerful footsteps, and, most of ail, Jeffrey'swhite face amid the pillows of the bed they had shared--these thingssubdued her and made her indelibly older. The doctors held out hope, but that was all. A long rest, they said, and quiet. So responsibilitycame to Roxanne. It was she who paid the bills, pored over hisbank-book, corresponded with his publishers. She was in the kitchenconstantly. She learned from the nurse how to prepare his meals andafter the first month took complete charge of the sick-room. She hadhad to let the nurse go for reasons of economy. One of the two coloredgirls left at the same time. Roxanne was realizing that they had beenliving from short story to short story. 

The most frequent visitor was Harry Cromwell. He had been shocked anddepressed by the news, and though his wife was now living with him inChicago he found time to come out several times a month. Roxanne foundhis sympathy welcome--there was some quality of suffering in the man, some inherent pitifulness that made her comfortable when he was near. Roxanne's nature had suddenly deepened. She felt sometimes that withJeffrey she was losing her children also, those children that now mostof all she needed and should have had. 

It was six months after Jeffrey's collapse and when the nightmare hadfaded, leaving not the old world but a new one, grayer and colder, that she wait to see Harry's wife. Finding herself in Chicago with anextra hour before train time, she decided out of courtesy to call. 

As she stepped inside the door she had an immediate impression thatthe apartment was very like some place she had seen before--and almostinstantly she remembered a round-the-corner bakery of her childhood, abakery full of rows and rows of pink frosted cakes--a stuffy pink, pink as a food, pink triumphant, vulgar, and odious. 

And this apartment was like that. It was pink. It smelled pink!

Mrs. Cromwell, attired in a wrapper of pink and black, opened thedoor. Her hair was yellow, heightened, Roxanne imagined by a dash ofperoxide in the rinsing water every week. Her eyes were a thin waxenblue--she was pretty and too consciously graceful. Her cordiality wasstrident and intimate, hostility melted so quickly to hospitality thatit seemed they were both merely in the face and voice--never touchingnor touched by the deep core of egotism beneath. 

But to Roxanne these things were secondary; her eyes were caught andheld in uncanny fascination by the wrapper. It was vilely unclean. From its lowest hem up four inches it was sheerly dirty with the bluedust of the floor; for the next three inches it was gray--then itshaded off into its natural color, which, was--pink. It was dirty atthe sleeves, too, and at the collar--and when the woman turned to leadthe way into the parlor, Roxanne was sure that her neck was dirty. 

A one-sided rattle of conversation began. Mrs. Cromwell becameexplicit about her likes and dislikes, her head, her stomach, herteeth, her apartment--avoiding with a sort of insolent meticulousnessany inclusion of Roxanne with life, as if presuming that Roxanne, having been dealt a blow, wished life to be carefully skirted. 

Roxanne smiled. That kimono! That neck!

After five minutes a little boy toddled into the parlor--a dirtylittle boy clad in dirty pink rompers. His face was smudgy--Roxannewanted to take him into her lap and wipe his nose; other parts in theof his head needed attention, his tiny shoes were kicked out at thetoes. Unspeakable!

"What a darling little boy!" exclaimed Roxanne, smiling radiantly. "Come here to me. "

Mrs. Cromwell looked coldly at her son. 

"He will get dirty. Look at that face!" She held her head on one sideand regarded it critically. 

"Isn't he a _darling?_" repeated Roxanne. 

"Look at his rompers, " frowned Mrs. Cromwell. 

"He needs a change, don't you, George?"

George stared at her curiously. To his mind the word rompersconnotated a garment extraneously smeared, as this one. 

"I tried to make him look respectable this morning, " complained Mrs. Cromwell as one whose patience had been sorely tried, "and I found hedidn't have any more rompers--so rather than have him go round withoutany I put him back in those--and his face--"

"How many pairs has he?" Roxanne's voice was pleasantly curious, "Howmany feather fans have you?" she might have asked. 

"Oh, --" Mrs. Cromwell considered, wrinkling her pretty brow. "Five, Ithink. Plenty, I know. "

"You can get them for fifty cents a pair. "

Mrs. Cromwell's eyes showed surprise--and the faintest superiority. The price of rompers!

"Can you really? I had no idea. He ought to have plenty, but I haven'thad a minute all week to send the laundry out. " Then, dismissing thesubject as irrelevant--"I must show you some things--"

They rose and Roxanne followed her past an open bathroom door whosegarment-littered floor showed indeed that the laundry hadn't been sentout for some time, into another room that was, so to speak, thequintessence of pinkness. This was Mrs. Cromwell's room. 

Here the Hostess opened a closet door and displayed before' Roxanne'seyes an amazing collection of lingerie. 

There were dozens of filmy marvels of lace and silk, all clean, unruffled, seemingly not yet touched. On hangers beside them werethree new evening dresses. 

"I have some beautiful things, " said Mrs. Cromwell, "but not much of achance to wear them. Harry doesn't care about going out. " Spite creptinto her voice. "He's perfectly content to let me play nursemaid andhousekeeper all day and loving wife in the evening. "

Roxanne smiled again. 

"You've got some beautiful clothes here. "

"Yes, I have. Let me show you----"

"Beautiful, " repeated Roxanne, interrupting, "but I'll have to run ifI'm going to catch my train. "

She felt that her hands were trembling. She wanted to put them on thiswoman and shake her--shake her. She wanted her locked up somewhere andset to scrubbing floors. 

"Beautiful, " she repeated, "and I just came in for a moment. "

"Well, I'm sorry Harry isn't here. "

They moved toward the door. 

"--and, oh, " said Roxanne with an effort--yet her voice was stillgentle and her lips were smiling--"I think it's Argile's where you canget those rompers. Good-by. "

It was not until she had reached the station and bought her ticket toMarlowe that Roxanne realized it was the first five minutes in sixmonths that her mind had been off Jeffrey. 

IV

A week later Harry appeared at Marlowe, arrived unexpectedly at fiveo'clock, and coming up the walk sank into a porch chair in a state ofexhaustion. Roxanne herself had had a busy day and was worn out. Thedoctors were coming at five-thirty, bringing a celebrated nervespecialist from New York. She was excited and thoroughly depressed, but Harry's eyes made her sit down beside him. 

"What's the matter?"

"Nothing, Roxanne, " he denied. "I came to see how Jeff was doing. Don't you bother about me. "

"Harry, " insisted Roxanne, "there's something the matter. "

"Nothing, " he repeated. "How's Jeff?"

Anxiety darkened her face. 

"He's a little worse, Harry. Doctor Jewett has come on from New York. They thought he could tell me something definite. He's going to tryand find whether this paralysis has anything to do with the originalblood clot. "

Harry rose. 

"Oh, I'm sorry, " he said jerkily. "I didn't know you expected aconsultation. I wouldn't have come. I thought I'd just rock on yourporch for an hour--"

"Sit down, " she commanded. 

Harry hesitated. 

"Sit down, Harry, dear boy. " Her kindness flooded out now--envelopedhim. "I know there's something the matter. You're white as a sheet. I'm going to get you a cool bottle of beer. "

All at once he collapsed into his chair and covered his face with hishands. 

"I can't make her happy, " he said slowly. "I've tried and I've tried. This morning we had some words about breakfast--I'd been getting mybreakfast down town--and--well, just after I went to the office sheleft the house, went East to her mother's with George and a suitcasefull of lace underwear. "

"Harry!"

"And I don't know---"

There was a crunch on the gravel, a car turning into the drive. Roxanne uttered a little cry. 

"It's Doctor Jewett. "

"Oh, I'll---"

"You'll wait, won't you?" she interrupted abstractedly. He saw thathis problem had already died on the troubled surface of her mind. 

There was an embarrassing minute of vague, elided introductions andthen Harry followed the party inside and watched them disappear up thestairs. He went into the library and sat down on the big sofa. 

For an hour he watched the sun creep up the patterned folds of thechintz curtains. In the deep quiet a trapped wasp buzzing on theinside of the window pane assumed the proportions of a clamor. Fromtime to time another buzzing drifted down from up-stairs, resemblingseveral more larger wasps caught on larger window-panes. He heard lowfootfalls, the clink of bottles, the clamor of pouring water. 

What had he and Roxanne done that life should deal these crashingblows to them? Up-stairs there was taking place a living inquest onthe soul of his friend; he was sitting here in a quiet room listeningto the plaint of a wasp, just as when he was a boy he had beencompelled by a strict aunt to sit hour-long on a chair and atone forsome misbehavior. But who had put him here? What ferocious aunt hadleaned out of the sky to make him atone for--what?

About Kitty he felt a great hopelessness. She was too expensive--thatwas the irremediable difficulty. Suddenly he hated her. He wanted tothrow her down and kick at her--to tell her she was a cheat and aleech--that she was dirty. Moreover, she must give him his boy. 

He rose and began pacing up and down the room. Simultaneously he heardsome one begin walking along the hallway up-stairs in exact time withhim. He found himself wondering if they would walk in time until theperson reached the end of the hall. 

Kitty had gone to her mother. God help her, what a mother to go to! Hetried to imagine the meeting: the abused wife collapsing upon themother's breast. He could not. That Kitty was capable of any deepgrief was unbelievable. He had gradually grown to think of her assomething unapproachable and callous. She would get a divorce, ofcourse, and eventually she would marry again. He began to considerthis. Whom would she marry? He laughed bitterly, stopped; a pictureflashed before him--of Kitty's arms around some man whose face hecould not see, of Kitty's lips pressed close to other lips in what wassurely: passion. 

"God!" he cried aloud. "God! God! God!"

Then the pictures came thick and fast. The Kitty of this morningfaded; the soiled kimono rolled up and disappeared; the pouts, andrages, and tears all were washed away. Again she was Kitty Carr--KittyCarr with yellow hair and great baby eyes. Ah, she had loved him, shehad loved him. 

After a while he perceived that something was amiss with him, something that had nothing to do with Kitty or Jeff, something of adifferent genre. Amazingly it burst on him at last; he was hungry. Simple enough! He would go into the kitchen in a moment and ask thecolored cook for a sandwich. After that he must go back to the city. 

He paused at the wall, jerked at something round, and, fingering itabsently, put it to his mouth and tasted it as a baby tastes a brighttoy. His teeth closed on it--Ah!

She'd left that damn kimono, that dirty pink kimono. She might havehad the decency to take it with her, he thought. It would hang in thehouse like the corpse of their sick alliance. He would try to throw itaway, but he would never be able to bring himself to move it. It wouldbe like Kitty, soft and pliable, withal impervious. You couldn't moveKitty; you couldn't reach Kitty. There was nothing there to reach. Heunderstood that perfectly--he had understood it all along. 

He reached to the wall for another biscuit and with an effort pulledit out, nail and all. He carefully removed the nail from the centre, wondering idly if he had eaten the nail with the first biscuit. Preposterous! He would have remembered--it was a huge nail. He felthis stomach. He must be very hungry. He considered--remembered--yesterday he had had no dinner. It was the girl's day out and Kittyhad lain in her room eating chocolate drops. She had said she felt"smothery" and couldn't bear having him near her. He had givenGeorge a bath and put him to bed, and then lain down on the couchintending to rest a minute before getting his own dinner. Therehe had fallen asleep and awakened about eleven, to find thatthere was nothing in the ice-box except a spoonful of potato salad. This he had eaten, together with some chocolate drops that he found onKitty's bureau. This morning he had breakfasted hurriedly down townbefore going to the office. But at noon, beginning to worry aboutKitty, he had decided to go home and take her out to lunch. After thatthere had been the note on his pillow. The pile of lingerie in thecloset was gone--and she had left instructions for sending her trunk. 

He had never been so hungry, he thought. 

At five o'clock, when the visiting nurse tiptoed down-stairs, he wassitting on the sofa staring at the carpet. 

"Mr. Cromwell?"

"Yes?"

"Oh, Mrs. Curtain won't be able to see you at dinner. She's not wellShe told me to tell you that the cook will fix you something and thatthere's a spare bedroom. "

"She's sick, you say?"

"She's lying down in her room. The consultation is just over. "

"Did they--did they decide anything?"

"Yes, " said the nurse softly. "Doctor Jewett says there's no hope. Mr. Curtain may live indefinitely, but he'll never see again or move againor think. He'll just breathe. "

"Just breathe?"

"Yes. "

For the first time the nurse noted that beside the writing-desk whereshe remembered that she had seen a line of a dozen curious roundobjects she had vaguely imagined to be some exotic form of decoration, there was now only one. Where the others had been, there was now aseries of little nail-holes. 

Harry followed her glance dazedly and then rose to his feet. 

"I don't believe I'll stay. I believe there's a train. "

She nodded. Harry picked up his hat. 

"Good-by, " she said pleasantly. 

"Good-by, " he answered, as though talking to himself and, evidentlymoved by some involuntary necessity, he paused on his way to the doorand she saw him pluck the last object from the wall and drop it intohis pocket. 

Then he opened the screen door and, descending the porch steps, passedout of her sight. 

V

After a while the coat of clean white paint on the Jeffrey Curtainhouse made a definite compromise with the suns of many Julys andshowed its good faith by turning gray. It scaled--huge peelings ofvery brittle old paint leaned over backward like aged men practisinggrotesque gymnastics and finally dropped to a moldy death in theovergrown grass beneath. The paint on the front pillars becamestreaky; the white ball was knocked off the left-hand door-post; thegreen blinds darkened, then lost all pretense of color. 

It began to be a house that was avoided by the tender-minded--somechurch bought a lot diagonally opposite for a graveyard, and this, combined with "the place where Mrs. Curtain stays with that livingcorpse, " was enough to throw a ghostly aura over that quarter of theroad. Not that she was left alone. Men and women came to see her, mether down town, where she went to do her marketing, brought her home intheir cars--and came in for a moment to talk and to rest, in theglamour that still played in her smile. But men who did not know herno longer followed her with admiring glances in the street; adiaphanous veil had come down over her beauty, destroying itsvividness, yet bringing neither wrinkles nor fat. 

She acquired a character in the village--a group of little storieswere told of her: how when the country was frozen over one winter sothat no wagons nor automobiles could travel, she taught herself toskate so that she could make quick time to the grocer and druggist, and not leave Jeffrey alone for long. It was said that every nightsince his paralysis she slept in a small bed beside his bed, holdinghis hand. 

Jeffrey Curtain was spoken of as though he were already dead. As theyears dropped by those who had known him died or moved away--therewere but half a dozen of the old crowd who had drunk cocktailstogether, called each other's wives by their first names, and thoughtthat Jeff was about the wittiest and most talented fellow that Marlowehad ever known. How, to the casual visitor, he was merely the reasonthat Mrs. Curtain excused herself sometimes and hurried upstairs; hewas a groan or a sharp cry borne to the silent parlor on the heavy airof a Sunday afternoon. 

He could not move; he was stone blind, dumb and totally unconscious. All day he lay in his bed, except for a shift to his wheel-chair everymorning while she straightened the room. His paralysis was creepingslowly toward his heart. At first-for the first year--Roxanne hadreceived the faintest answering pressure sometimes when she held hishand--then it had gone, ceased one evening and never come back, andthrough two nights Roxanne lay wide-eyed, staring into the dark andwondering what had gone, what fraction of his soul had taken flight, what last grain of comprehension those shattered broken nerves stillcarried to the brain. 

After that hope died. Had it not been for her unceasing care the lastspark would have gone long before. Every morning she shaved and bathedhim, shifted him with her own hands from bed to chair and back to bed. She was in his room constantly, bearing medicine, straightening apillow, talking to him almost as one talks to a nearly human dog, without hope of response or appreciation, but with the dim persuasionof habit, a prayer when faith has gone. 

Not a few people, one celebrated nerve specialist among them, gave hera plain impression that it was futile to exercise so much care, thatif Jeffrey had been conscious he would have wished to die, that if hisspirit were hovering in some wider air it would agree to no suchsacrifice from her, it would fret only for the prison of its body togive it full release. 

"But you see, " she replied, shaking her head gently, "when I marriedJeffrey it was--until I ceased to love him. "

"But, " was protested, in effect, "you can't love that. "

"I can love what it once was. What else is there for me to do?"

The specialist shrugged his shoulders and went away to say that Mrs. Curtain was a remarkable woman and just about as sweet as anangel--but, he added, it was a terrible pity. 

"There must be some man, or a dozen, just crazy to take care ofher. . . . "

Casually--there were. Here and there some one began in hope--and endedin reverence. There was no love in the woman except, strangely enough, for life, for the people in the world, from the tramp to whom she gavefood she could ill afford to the butcher who sold her a cheap cut ofsteak across the meaty board. The other phase was sealed up somewherein that expressionless mummy who lay with his face turned ever towardthe light as mechanically as a compass needle and waited dumbly forthe last wave to wash over his heart. 

After eleven years he died in the middle of a May night, when thescent of the syringa hung upon the window-sill and a breeze wafted inthe shrillings of the frogs and cicadas outside. Roxanne awoke at two, and realized with a start she was alone in the house at last. 

VI

After that she sat on her weather-beaten porch through manyafternoons, gazing down across the fields that undulated in a slowdescent to the white and green town. She was wondering what she woulddo with her life. She was thirty-six--handsome, strong, and free. Theyears had eaten up Jeffrey's insurance; she had reluctantly partedwith the acres to right and left of her, and had even placed a smallmortgage on the house. 

With her husband's death had come a great physical restlessness. Shemissed having to care for him in the morning, she missed her rush totown, and the brief and therefore accentuated neighborly meetings inthe butcher's and grocer's; she missed the cooking for two, thepreparation of delicate liquid food for him. One day, consumed withenergy, she went out and spaded up the whole garden, a thing that hadnot been done for years. 

And she was alone at night in the room that had seen the glory of hermarriage and then the pain. To meet Jeff again she went back in spiritto that wonderful year, that intense, passionate absorption andcompanionship, rather than looked forward to a problematical meetinghereafter; she awoke often to lie and wish for that presence besideher--inanimate yet breathing--still Jeff. 

One afternoon six months after his death she was sitting on the porch, in a black dress which took away the faintest suggestion of plumpnessfrom her figure. It was Indian summer--golden brown all about her; ahush broken by the sighing of leaves; westward a four o'clock sundripping streaks of red and yellow over a flaming sky. Most of thebirds had gone--only a sparrow that had built itself a nest on thecornice of a pillar kept up an intermittent cheeping varied byoccasional fluttering sallies overhead. Roxanne moved her chair towhere she could watch him and her mind idled drowsily on the bosom ofthe afternoon. 

Harry Cromwell was coming out from Chicago to dinner. Since hisdivorce over eight years before he had been a frequent visitor. Theyhad kept up what amounted to a tradition between them: when he arrivedthey would go to look at Jeff; Harry would sit down on the edge of thebed and in a hearty voice ask:

"Well, Jeff, old man, how do you feel to-day?"

Roxanne, standing beside, would look intently at Jeff, dreaming thatsome shadowy recognition of this former friend had passed across thatbroken mind--but the head, pale, carven, would only move slowly in itssole gesture toward the light as if something behind the blind eyeswere groping for another light long since gone out. 

These visits stretched over eight years--at Easter, Christmas, Thanksgiving, and on many a Sunday Harry had arrived, paid his call onJeff, and then talked for a long while with Roxanne on the porch. Hewas devoted to her. He made no pretense of hiding, no attempt todeepen, this relation. She was his best friend as the mass of flesh onthe bed there had been his best friend. She was peace, she was rest;she was the past. Of his own tragedy she alone knew. 

He had been at the funeral, but since then the company for which heworked had shifted him to the East and only a business trip hadbrought him to the vicinity of Chicago. Roxanne had written him tocome when he could--after a night in the city he had caught a trainout. 

They shook hands and he helped her move two rockers together. 

"How's George?"

"He's fine, Roxanne. Seems to like school. "

"Of course it was the only thing to do, to send him. "

"Of course---"

"You miss him horribly, Harry?"

"Yes--I do miss him. He's a funny boy---"

He talked a lot about George. Roxanne was interested. Harry must bringhim out on his next vacation. She had only seen him once in herlife--a child in dirty rompers. 

She left him with the newspaper while she prepared dinner--she hadfour chops to-night and some late vegetables from her own garden. Sheput it all on and then called him, and sitting down together theycontinued their talk about George. 

"If I had a child--" she would say. 

Afterward, Harry having given her what slender advice he could aboutinvestments, they walked through the garden, pausing here and there torecognize what had once been a cement bench or where the tennis courthad lain. . . . 

"Do you remember--"

Then they were off on a flood of reminiscences: the day they had takenall the snap-shots and Jeff had been photographed astride the calf;and the sketch Harry had made of Jeff and Roxanne, lying sprawled inthe grass, their heads almost touching. There was to have been acovered lattice connecting the barn-studio with the house, so thatJeff could get there on wet days--the lattice had been started, butnothing remained except a broken triangular piece that still adheredto the house and resembled a battered chicken coop. 

"And those mint juleps!"

"And Jeff's note-book! Do you remember how we'd laugh, Harry, whenwe'd get it out of his pocket and read aloud a page of material. Andhow frantic he used to get?"

"Wild! He was such a kid about his writing. "

They were both silent a moment, and then Harry said:

"We were to have a place out here, too. Do you remember? We were tobuy the adjoining twenty acres. And the parties we were going tohave!"

Again there was a pause, broken this time by a low question fromRoxanne. 

"Do you ever hear of her, Harry?"

"Why--yes, " he admitted placidly. "She's in Seattle. She's marriedagain to a man named Horton, a sort of lumber king. He's a great dealolder than she is, I believe. "

"And she's behaving?"

"Yes--that is, I've heard so. She has everything, you see. Nothingmuch to do except dress up for this fellow at dinner-time. "

"I see. "

Without effort he changed the subject. 

"Are you going to keep the house?"

"I think so, " she said, nodding. "I've lived here so long, Harry, it'dseem terrible to move. I thought of trained nursing, but of coursethat'd mean leaving. I've about decided to be a boarding-house lady. "

"Live in one?"

"No. Keep one. Is there such an anomaly as a boarding-house lady?Anyway I'd have a negress and keep about eight people in the summerand two or three, if I can get them, in the winter. Of course I'llhave to have the house repainted and gone over inside. "

Harry considered. 

"Roxanne, why--naturally you know best what you can do, but it doesseem a shock, Roxanne. You came here as a bride. "

"Perhaps, " she said, "that's why I don't mind remaining here as aboarding-house lady. "

"I remember a certain batch of biscuits. "

"Oh, those biscuits, " she cried. "Still, from all I heard about theway you devoured them, they couldn't have been so bad. I was _so_low that day, yet somehow I laughed when the nurse told me about thosebiscuits. "

"I noticed that the twelve nail-holes are still in the library wallwhere Jeff drove them. "

"Yes. "

It was getting very dark now, a crispness settled in the air; a littlegust of wind sent down a last spray of leaves. Roxanne shiveredslightly. 

"We'd better go in. "

He looked at his watch. 

"It's late. I've got to be leaving. I go East tomorrow. "

"Must you?"

They lingered for a moment just below the stoop, watching a moon thatseemed full of snow float out of the distance where the lake lay. Summer was gone and now Indian summer. The grass was cold and therewas no mist and no dew. After he left she would go in and light thegas and close the shatters, and he would go down the path and on tothe village. To these two life had come quickly and gone, leaving notbitterness, but pity; not disillusion, but only pain. There wasalready enough moonlight when they shook hands for each to see thegathered kindness in the other's eyes. 

MR. ICKY

THE QUINTESSENCE OF QUAINTNESS IN ONE ACT

_The Scene is the Exterior of a Cottage in West Issacshire on adesperately Arcadian afternoon in August. _ MR. ICKY, _quaintlydressed in the costume of an Elizabethan peasant, is pottering anddoddering among the pots and dods. He is an old man, well past theprime of life, no longer young, From the fact that there is a burr inhis speech and that he has absent-mindedly put on his coat wrongsideout, we surmise that he is either above or below the ordinarysuperficialities of life. _

_Near him on the grass lies _PETER_, a little boy. _PETER_, of course, has his chin on his palm like the picturesof the young Sir Walter Raleigh. He has a complete set of features, including serious, sombre, even funereal, gray eyes--and radiates thatalluring air of never having eaten food. This air can best be radiatedduring the afterglow of a beef dinner. Be is looking at _MR. ICKY_, fascinated. _

_Silence. . . . The song of birds. _

PETER: Often at night I sit at my window and regard the stars. Sometimes I think they're my stars. . . . (_Gravely_) I think Ishall be a star some day. . . . 

ME. ICKY: (_Whimsically_) Yes, yes . . . Yes. . . . 

PETER: I know them all: Venus, Mars, Neptune, Gloria Swanson. 

MR. ICKY: I don't take no stock in astronomy. . . . I've been thinking o'Lunnon, laddie. And calling to mind my daughter, who has gone for tobe a typewriter. . . . (_He sighs. _)

PETER: I liked Ulsa, Mr. Icky; she was so plump, so round, so buxom. 

MR. ICKY: Not worth the paper she was padded with, laddie. (_Hestumbles over a pile of pots and dods. _)

PETER: How is your asthma, Mr. Icky?

MR. ICKY: Worse, thank God!. . . (_Gloomily. )_ I'm a hundred yearsold. . . I'm getting brittle. 

PETER: I suppose life has been pretty tame since you gave up pettyarson. 

MR. ICKY: Yes. . . Yes. . . . You see, Peter, laddie, when I was fifty Ireformed once--in prison. 

PETER: You went wrong again?

MR. ICKY: Worse than that. The week before my term expired theyinsisted on transferring to me the glands of a healthy young prisonerthey were executing. 

PETER: And it renovated you?

MR. ICKY: Renovated me! It put the Old Nick back into me! This youngcriminal was evidently a suburban burglar and a kleptomaniac. What wasa little playful arson in comparison!

PETER: (_Awed_) How ghastly! Science is the bunk. 

MR. ICKY: (_Sighing_) I got him pretty well subdued now. 'Tisn'tevery one who has to tire out two sets o' glands in his lifetime. Iwouldn't take another set for all the animal spirits in an orphanasylum. 

PETER: (_Considering_) I shouldn't think you'd object to a nicequiet old clergyman's set. 

MR. ICKY: Clergymen haven't got glands--they have souls. 

(_There is a low, sonorous honking off stage to indicate that alarge motor-car has stopped in the immediate vicinity. Then a youngman handsomely attired in a dress-suit and a patent-leather silk hatcomes onto the stage. He is very mundane. His contrast to thespirituality of the other two is observable as far back as the firstrow of the balcony. This is_ RODNEY DIVINE. )

DIVINE: I am looking for Ulsa Icky. 

(MR. ICKY _rises and stands tremulously between two dods. _)

MR. ICKY: My daughter is in Lunnon. 

DIVINE: She has left London. She is coming here. I have followed her. 

(_He reaches into the little mother-of-pearl satchel that hangs athis side for cigarettes. He selects one and scratching a match touchesit to the cigarette. The cigarette instantly lights. _)

DIVINE: I shall wait. 

(_He waits. Several hours pass. There is no sound except anoccasional cackle or hiss from the dods as they quarrel amongthemselves. Several songs can be introduced here or some card tricksby_ DIVINE _or a tumbling act, as desired. _)

DIVINE: It's very quiet here. 

MR. ICKY: Yes, very quiet. . . . 

(_Suddenly a loudly dressed girl appears; she is very worldly. Itis _ULSA ICKY. _ On her is one of those shapeless faces peculiar toearly Italian painting. _)

ULSA: (_In a coarse, worldly voice_) Feyther! Here I am! Ulsa didwhat?

MR. ICKY: (_Tremulously_) Ulsa, little Ulsa. (_They embraceeach other's torsos. _)

MR. ICKY: (_Hopefully_) You've come back to help with theploughing. 

ULSA: (_Sullenly_) No, feyther; ploughing's such a beyther. I'dreyther not. 

(_Though her accent is broad, the content of her speech is sweet andclean. _)

DIVINE: (_Conciliatingly_) See here, Ulsa. Let's come to anunderstanding. 

(_He advances toward her with the graceful, even stride that madehim captain of the striding team at Cambridge. _)

ULSA: You still say it would be Jack?

MR. ICKY: What does she mean?

DIVINE: (_Kindly_) My dear, of course, it would be Jack. Itcouldn't be Frank. 

MR. ICKY: Frank who?

ULSA: It _would_ be Frank!

(_Some risqué joke can be introduced here. _)

MR. ICKY: (_Whimsically_) No good fighting. . . No good fighting. . . 

DIVINE: (_Reaching out to stroke her arm with the powerful movementthat made him stroke of the crew at Oxford_) You'd better marry me. 

ULSA: (_Scornfully_) Why, they wouldn't let me in through theservants' entrance of your house. 

DIVINE: (_Angrily_) They wouldn't! Never fear--you shall come inthrough the mistress' entrance. 

ULSA: Sir!

DIVINE: (_In confusion_) I beg your pardon. You know what I mean?

MR. ICKY: (_Aching with whimsey_) You want to marry my littleUlsa?. . . 

DIVINE: I do. 

MR. ICKY: Your record is clean. 

DIVINE: Excellent. I have the best constitution in the world---

ULSA: And the worst by-laws. 

DIVINE: At Eton I was a member at Pop; at Rugby I belonged toNear-beer. As a younger son I was destined for the police force---

MR. ICKY: Skip that. . . . Have you money?. . . 

DIVINE: Wads of it. I should expect Ulsa to go down town in sectionsevery morning--in two Rolls Royces. I have also a kiddy-car and aconverted tank. I have seats at the opera---

ULSA: (_Sullenly_) I can't sleep except in a box. And I've heardthat you were cashiered from your club. 

MR. ICKY: A cashier? . . . 

DIVINE: (_Hanging his head_) I was cashiered. 

ULSA: What for?

DIVINE: (_Almost inaudibly_) I hid the polo bails one day for ajoke. 

MR. ICKY: Is your mind in good shape?

DIVINE: (_Gloomily_) Fair. After all what is brilliance? Merelythe tact to sow when no one is looking and reap when every one is. 

ME. ICKY; Be careful. . . . I will-not marry my daughter to an epigram. . . . 

DIVINE: (_More gloomily_) I assure you I'm a mere platitude. Ioften descend to the level of an innate idea. 

ULSA: (_Dully_) None of what you're saying matters. I can't marrya man who thinks it would be Jack. Why Frank would--

DIVINE: (_Interrupting_) Nonsense!

ULSA: (_Emphatically_) You're a fool!

MR. ICKY: Tut-tut! . . . One should not judge . . . Charity, my girl. Whatwas it Nero said?--"With malice toward none, with charity towardall---"

PETER: That wasn't Nero. That was John Drinkwater. 

MR. ICKY: Come! Who is this Frank? Who is this Jack?

DIVINE: (_Morosely_) Gotch. 

ULSA: Dempsey. 

DIVINE: We were arguing that if they were deadly enemies and locked ina room together which one would come out alive. Now I claimed thatJack Dempsey would take one---

ULSA: (_Angrily_) Rot! He wouldn't have a---

DIVINE: (_Quickly_) You win. 

ULSA: Then I love you again. 

MR. ICKY: So I'm going to lose my little daughter. . . 

ULSA: You've still got a houseful of children, (CHARLES, ULSA'S _brother, coming out of the cottage. He is dressedas if to go to sea; a coil of rope is slung about his shoulder and ananchor is hanging from his neck. _)

CHARLES: (_Not seeing them_) I'm going to sea! I'm going to sea!

(_His voice is triumphant. _)

MR. ICKY: (_Sadly_) You went to seed long ago. 

CHARLES: I've been reading "Conrad. "

PETER: (_Dreamily_) "Conrad, " ah! "Two Years Before the Mast, " byHenry James. 

CHARLES: What?

PETER: Walter Pater's version of "Robinson Crusoe. "

CHARLES: (_To his feyther_) I can't stay here and rot with you. Iwant to live my life. I want to hunt eels. 

MR. ICKY: I will be here. . . When you come back. . . . 

CHARLES: (_Contemptuously_) Why, the worms are licking theirchops already when they hear your name. 

(_It will be noticed that some of the characters have not spoken forsome time. It will improve the technique if they can be rendering aspirited saxophone number. _)

MR. ICKY: (_Mournfully_) These vales, these hills, theseMcCormick harvesters--they mean nothing to my children. I understand. 

CHARLES: (_More gently_) Then you'll think of me kindly, feyther. To understand is to forgive. 

MR. ICKY: No. . . No. . . . We never forgive those we can understand. . . . Wecan only forgive those who wound us for no reason at all. . . . 

CHARLES: (_Impatiently_) I'm so beastly sick of your human natureline. And, anyway, I hate the hours around here. 

(_Several dozen more of _MR. ICKY'S_ children trip out of thehouse, trip over the grass, and trip over the pots and dods. They aremuttering "We are going away, " and "We are leaving you. "_)

MR. ICKY: (_His heart breaking_) They're all deserting me. I'vebeen too kind. Spare the rod and spoil the fun. Oh, for the glands ofa Bismarck. 

(_There is a honking outside--probably _DIVINE'S_ chauffeurgrowing impatient for his master. _)

MR. ICKY: (_In misery_) They do not love the soil! They have beenfaithless to the Great Potato Tradition! (_He picks up a handful ofsoil passionately and rubs it on his bald head. Hair sprouts. _) Oh, Wordsworth, Wordsworth, how true you spoke!

 _"No motion has she now, no force; She does not hear or feel; Roll'd round on earth's diurnal course In some one's Oldsmobile. "_

(_They all groan and shouting "Life" and "Jazz" move slowly towardthe wings. _)

CHARLES: Back to the soil, yes! I've been trying to turn my back tothe soil for ten years!

ANOTHER CHILD: The farmers may be the backbone of the country, but whowants to be a backbone?

ANOTHER CHILD: I care not who hoes the lettuce of my country if I caneat the salad!

ALL: Life! Psychic Research! Jazz!

MR. ICKY: (_Struggling with himself_) I must be quaint. That'sall there is. It's not life that counts, it's the quaintness you bringto it. . . . 

ALL: We're going to slide down the Riviera. We've got tickets forPiccadilly Circus. Life! Jazz!

MR. ICKY: Wait. Let me read to you from the Bible. Let me open it atrandom. One always finds something that bears on the situation. 

(_He finds a Bible lying in one of the dods and opening it at randombegins to read. _)

"Ahab and Istemo and Anim, Goson and Olon and Gilo, eleven cities andtheir villages. Arab, and Ruma, and Esaau--"

CHARLES: (_Cruelly_) Buy ten more rings and try again. 

MR. ICKY: (_Trying again_) "How beautiful art thou my love, howbeautiful art thou! Thy eyes are dove's eyes, besides what is hidwithin. Thy hair is as flocks of goats which come up from MountGalaad--Hm! Rather a coarse passage. . . . "

(_His children laugh at him rudely, shouting "Jazz!" and "All lifeis primarily suggestive!"_)

MR. ICKY: (_Despondently_) It won't work to-day. (_Hopefully_) Maybe it's damp. (_He feels it_) Yes, it'sdamp. . . . There was water in the dod. . . . It won't work. 

ALL: It's damp! It won't work! Jazz!

ONE OF THE CHILDREN: Come, we must catch the six-thirty. 

(_Any other cue may be inserted here. _)

MR. ICKY: Good-by. . . . 

(_ They all go out. _ MR. ICKY _is left alone. He sighs andwalking over to the cottage steps, lies down, and closes his eyes. _)

_Twilight has come down and the stage is flooded with such light asnever was on land or sea. There is no sound except a sheep-herder'swife in the distance playing an aria from Beethoven's Tenth Symphony, on a mouth-organ. The great white and gray moths swoop down and lighton the old man until he is completely covered by them. But he does notstir. _

_The curtain goes up and down several times to denote the lapse ofseveral minutes. A good comedy effect can be obtained by having_MR. ICKY_ cling to the curtain and go up and down with it. Fireflies or fairies on wires can also be introduced at thispoint. _

_Then _PETER_ appears, a look of almost imbecile sweetness onhis face. In his hand he clutches something and from time to timeglances at it in a transport of ecstasy. After a struggle with himselfhe lays it on the old man's body and then quietly withdraws. _

_The moths chatter among themselves and then scurry away in suddenfright. And as night deepens there still sparkles there, small, whiteand round, breathing a subtle perfume to the West Issacshire breeze, _PETER'S_ gift of love--a moth-ball. _

(_The play can end at this point or can go on indefinitely. _)

JEMINA, THE MOUNTAIN GIRL

This don't pretend to be "Literature. " This is just a tale forred-blooded folks who want a _story_ and not just a lot of"psychological" stuff or "analysis. " Boy, you'll love it! Read ithere, see it in the movies, play it on the phonograph, run it throughthe sewing-machine. 

A WILD THING

It was night in the mountains of Kentucky. Wild hills rose on allsides. Swift mountain streams flowed rapidly up and down themountains. 

Jemima Tantrum was down at the stream, brewing whiskey at the familystill. 

She was a typical mountain girl. 

Her feet were bare. Her hands, large and powerful, hung down below herknees. Her face showed the ravages of work. Although but sixteen, shehad for over a dozen years been supporting her aged pappy and mappy bybrewing mountain whiskey. From time to time she would pause in hertask, and, filling a dipper full of the pure, invigorating liquid, would drain it off--then pursue her work with renewed vigor. 

She would place the rye in the vat, thresh it out with her feet and, in twenty minutes, the completed product would be turned out. 

A sudden cry made her pause in the act of draining a dipper and lookup. 

"Hello, " said a voice. It came from a man clad in hunting bootsreaching to his neck, who had emerged. 

"Can you tell me the way to the Tantrums' cabin?"

"Are you uns from the settlements down thar?"

She pointed her hand down to the bottom of the hill, where Louisvillelay. She had never been there; but once, before she was born, hergreat-grandfather, old Gore Tantrum, had gone into the settlements inthe company of two marshals, and had never come back. So the Tantrumsfrom generation to generation, had learned to dread civilization. 

The man was amused. He laughed a light tinkling laugh, the laugh of aPhiladelphian. Something in the ring of it thrilled her. She drank offanother dipper of whiskey. 

"Where is Mr. Tantrum, little girl?" he asked, not without kindness. 

She raised her foot and pointed her big toe toward the woods. "Thar inthe cabing behind those thar pines. Old Tantrum air my old man. "

The man from the settlements thanked her and strode off. He was fairlyvibrant with youth and personality. As he walked along he whistled andsang and turned handsprings and flapjacks, breathing in the fresh, cool air of the mountains. 

The air around the still was like wine. 

Jemina Tantrum watched him entranced. No one like him had ever comeinto her life before. 

She sat down on the grass and counted her toes. She counted eleven. She had learned arithmetic in the mountain school. 

A MOUNTAIN FEUD

Ten years before a lady from the settlements had opened a school onthe mountain. Jemina had no money, but she had paid her way inwhiskey, bringing a pailful to school every morning and leaving it onMiss Lafarge's desk. Miss Lafarge had died of delirium tremens after ayear's teaching, and so Jemina's education had stopped. 

Across the still stream, still another still was standing; It was thatof the Doldrums. The Doldrums and the Tantrums never exchanged calls. 

They hated each other. 

Fifty years before old Jem Doldrum and old Jem Tantrum had quarrelledin the Tantrum cabin over a game of slapjack. Jem Doldrum had thrownthe king of hearts in Jem Tantrum's face, and old Tantrum, enraged, had felled the old Doldrum with the nine of diamonds. Other Doldrumsand Tantrums had joined in and the little cabin was soon filled withflying cards. Harstrum Doldrum, one of the younger Doldrums, laystretched on the floor writhing in agony, the ace of hearts crammeddown his throat. Jem Tantrum, standing in the doorway; ran throughsuit after suit, his face alight with fiendish hatred. Old MappyTantrum stood on the table wetting down the Doldrums with hot whiskey. Old Heck Doldrum, having finally run out of trumps, was backed out ofthe cabin, striking left and right with his tobacco pouch, andgathering around him the rest of his clan. Then they mounted theirsteers and galloped furiously home. 

That night old man Doldrum and his sons, vowing vengeance, hadreturned, put a ticktock on the Tantrum window, stuck a pin in thedoorbell, and beaten a retreat. 

A week later the Tantrums had put Cod Liver Oil in the Doldrums'still, and so, from year to year, the feud had continued, first onefamily being entirely wiped out, then the other. 

THE BIRTH OF LOVE

Every day little Jemina worked the still on her side of the stream, and Boscoe Doldrum worked the still on his side. 

Sometimes, with automatic inherited hatred, the feudists would throwwhiskey at each other, and Jemina would come home smelling like aFrench table d'hôte. 

But now Jemina was too thoughtful to look across the stream. 

How wonderful the stranger had been and how oddly he was dressed! Inher innocent way she had never believed that there were any civilizedsettlements at all, and she had put the belief in them down to thecredulity of the mountain people. 

She turned to go up to the cabin, and, as she turned something struckher in the neck. It was a sponge, thrown by Boscoe Doldrum--a spongesoaked in whiskey from his still on the other side of the stream. 

"Hi, thar, Boscoe Doldrum, " she shouted in her deep bass voice. 

"Yo! Jemina Tantrum. Gosh ding yo'!" he returned. 

She continued her way to the cabin. 

The stranger was talking to her father. Gold had been discovered onthe Tantrum land, and the stranger, Edgar Edison, was trying to buythe land for a song. He was considering what song to offer. 

She sat upon her hands and watched him. 

He was wonderful. When he talked his lips moved. 

She sat upon the stove and watched him. 

Suddenly there came a blood-curdling scream. The Tantrums rushed tothe windows. 

It was the Doldrums. 

They had hitched their steers to trees and concealed themselves behindthe bushes and flowers, and soon a perfect rattle of stones and bricksbeat against the windows, bending them inward. 

"Father! father!" shrieked Jemina. 

Her father took down his slingshot from his slingshot rack on the walland ran his hand lovingly over the elastic band. He stepped to aloophole. Old Mappy Tantrum stepped to the coalhole. 

A MOUNTAIN BATTLE

The stranger was aroused at last. Furious to get at the Doldrums, hetried to escape from the house by crawling up the chimney. Then hethought there might be a door under the bead, but Jemina told himthere was not. He hunted for doors under the beds and sofas, but eachtime Jemina pulled him out and told him there were no doors there. Furious with anger, he beat upon the door and hollered at theDoldrums. They did not answer him, but kept up their fusillade ofbricks and stones against the window. Old Pappy Tantrum knew that justas soon as they were able to affect an aperture they would pour in andthe fight would be over. 

Then old Heck Doldrum, foaming at the mouth and expectorating on theground, left and right, led the attack. 

The terrific slingshots of Pappy Tantrum had not been without theireffect. A master shot had disabled one Doldrum, and another Doldrum, shot almost incessantly through the abdomen, fought feebly on. 

Nearer and nearer they approached the house. 

"We must fly, " shouted the stranger to Jemina. "I will sacrificemyself and bear you away. "

"No, " shouted Pappy Tantrum, his face begrimed. "You stay here and fiton. I will bar Jemina away. I will bar Mappy away. I will bar myselfaway. "

The man from the settlements, pale and trembling with anger, turned toHam Tantrum, who stood at the door throwing loophole after loophole atthe advancing Doldrums. 

"Will you cover the retreat?"

But Ham said that he too had Tantrums to bear away, but that he wouldleave himself here to help the stranger cover the retreat, if he couldthink of a way of doing it. 

Soon smoke began to filter through the floor and ceiling. Shem Doldrumhad come up and touched a match to old Japhet Tantrum's breath as heleaned from a loophole, and the alcoholic flames shot up on all sides. 

The whiskey in the bathtub caught fire. The walls began to fall in. 

Jemina and the man from the settlements looked at each other. 

"Jemina, " he whispered. 

"Stranger, " she answered, "We will die together, " he said. "If we had lived I would have takenyou to the city and married you. With your ability to hold liquor, your social success would have been assured. "

She caressed him idly for a moment, counting her toes softly toherself. The smoke grew thicker. Her left leg was on fire. 

She was a human alcohol lamp. 

Their lips met in one long kiss and then a wall fell on them andblotted them out. 

"As One. "

When the Doldrums burst through the ring of flame, they found themdead where they had fallen, their arms about each other. 

Old Jem Doldrum was moved. 

He took off his hat. 

He filled it with whiskey and drank it off. 

"They air dead, " he said slowly, "they hankered after each other. Thefit is over now. We must not part them. "

So they threw them together into the stream and the two splashes theymade were as one.