[Illustration: Copyright, 1911, by Dodd, Mead & CompanyNellie Duluth]

What's-His-Name

BY

GEORGE BARR McCUTCHEON

WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY

HARRISON FISHER

NEW YORK

GROSSET & DUNLAP

PUBLISHERS

Copyright, 1910, 1911

BY

GEORGE BARR McCUTCHEON

Published March, 1911

CONTENTS

 CHAPTER PAGE I. Our Hero 1 II. Miss Nellie Duluth 31 III. Mr. Fairfax 71 IV. Luncheon 95 V. Christmas 124 VI. The Revolver 150 VII. The Lawyer 176 VIII. Blakeville 201

ILLUSTRATIONS

 Nellie Duluth Frontispiece

 Fairfax was sitting on a trunk, a satisfied smile on his lips 67

 Phoebe 134

 He stopped, aghast, petrified 238

WHAT'S-HIS-NAME

CHAPTER I

OUR HERO

Two men were standing in front of the Empire Theatre on Broadway, atthe outer edge of the sidewalk, amiably discussing themselves in thefirst person singular. It was late in September and somewhat early inthe day for actors to be abroad, a circumstance which invitesspeculation. Attention to their conversation, which was marked by thehabitual humility, would have convinced the listener (who is alwayswelcome) that both had enjoyed a successful season on the road, although closing somewhat prematurely on account of miserable booking, and that both had received splendid "notices" in every town visited. 

These two loiterers serve a single purpose in this tale--they drawyour attention to the principal character, to the person who plays thetitle rôle, so to speak, and then, having done so, sink back into anoblivion from which it is quite unnecessary to retrieve them. 

The younger of the two players was in the act of lighting acigarette, considerately tendered by the older, when his gaze fellupon the figure of the approaching hero. He hesitated for a moment, squinting his eyes reflectively as if to make sure of both vision andmemory before committing himself to the declaration that was tofollow. 

"See that fellow there? The little chap with his hands in hispockets?"

The other permitted a vague, indifferent glance to enter the throng ofpedestrians, plainly showing that he did not see the person indicated. (Please note this proof of the person's qualifications as a hero. )

"The fellow in front of Browne's, " added the first speaker, so eagerlythat his friend tried once more and succeeded. 

"What of him?" he demanded, unimpressed. 

"That is What's-His-Name, Nellie Duluth's husband. "

The friend's stare was prolonged and incredulous. 

"That?"

"Yes. That's the fair Nellie's anchor. Isn't he a wonder?"

The object of these remarks passed slowly in front of them and soonwas lost in the crowd. Now that we know who he is we will say thankyou to the obliging Thespian and be off up Broadway in his wake, notprecisely in the capacity of spies and eavesdroppers, but asacquaintances who would know him better. 

He was not an imposing figure. You would not have looked twice at him. You could not have remembered looking once at him, for that matter. Hewas the type of man who ambles through life without being noticed, even by those amiably inclined persons who make it their business tosee everything that is going on, no matter how trivial it is. 

Somewhere in this wide and unfeeling world the husband of NellieDuluth had an identity of his own, but New York was not the place. Back in the little Western town from which he came he had a name and apersonality all his own, but it was a far cry from Broadway and itsenvironments. For a matter of four or five years he had been knownsimply as "Er--What's-His-Name? Nellie Duluth's husband!" You haveknown men of his stripe, I am sure; men who never get anywhere for thegood and sufficient reason that it isn't necessary. Men who standstill. Men who do not even shine by reflected glory. Men whose namesyou cannot remember. It might be Smith or Brown or Jones, or any ofthe names you can't forget if you try, and yet it always escapes you. You know the sort I mean. 

Nellie Duluth's husband was a smallish young man, nice-looking, evenkind-looking, with an habitual expression of inquiry in his face, justas if he never quite got used to seeing or being seen. The most experttailor haberdasher could not have provided him with apparel thatreally belonged to him. Not that he was awkward or ill-favoured in thematter of figure, but that he lacked individuality. He always seemedto be a long way from home. 

Sometimes you were sure that he affected a slight, straw-colouredmoustache; then, a moment afterward, if you turned your back, you werenot quite sure about it. As a matter of fact, he did possess such anadornment. The trouble came in remembering it. Then, again, his eyeswere babyish blue and unseasoned; he was always looking into shopwindows, getting accustomed to the sights. Trolley cars andautomobiles were never-decreasing novelties to him, if you were tojudge by the startled way in which he gazed at them. His respect forthe crossing policeman, his courtesy to the street-car conductor, histimidity in the presence of the corner newsboy, were only surpassed byhis deference to the waiter in the cheap restaurants he affected. 

But, ah! You should have seen him in that little Western town! He wasa "devil of a fellow" out there! He knew the policemen by their firstnames and had no respect for them; street-car conductors werehail-fellows well met, and the newsboys wore spectacles and said "Yes, sir, " to him. As for the waiters, he knew them all by their Christianname, which usually was Annie or Mamie or Katie. 

On Broadway he was quite another person. He knew his Broadway from oneend to the other--that is to say, he knew that side of the "GreatWhite Way" which stares you in the face and rebukes you for staringback--the outside of Broadway. He had been on and off Broadway for amatter of five years and yet he had never recovered from the habit ofturning out for every pedestrian he met, giving the other man theright of way instead of holding to his own half of it, sometimesstepping in puddles of water to do so and not infrequently being edgedoff the curbstone by an accumulation of the unexpected. 

Once in a while during his peregrinations some one recognised him andbowed in a hesitating manner, as if trying to place him, and at suchtimes he responded with a beaming smile and a half-carried-out impulseto stop for a bit of a chat, but always with a subsequent accelerationof speed on discovering that the other fellow seemed to be in a hurry. They doubtless knew him for Miss Duluth's husband, but for the life ofthem they couldn't call him by name. Every one understood that Nelliepossessed a real name, but no one thought to ask what it was. 

Moreover, Nellie had a small daughter whose name was Phoebe. Sheunquestionably was a collaboration, but every one who knew the childspoke of her as that "darling little girl of Nellie's. " The only manin New York who appeared to know Nellie's husband by name was thepostman, and he got it second-hand. 

At the stage door of the theatre he was known as Miss Duluth'shusband, to the stage hands and the members of the chorus he wasWhat's-His-Name, to the principals he was "old chap, " to Nellieherself he was Harvey, to Phoebe he was "daddy, " to the press agent hewas nameless--he didn't exist. 

You could see Nellie in big red letters on all the billboards. She wasinevitable. Her face smiled at you from every nook and corner--and itwas a pretty face, too--and you had to get your tickets of thescalpers if you wanted to see her in person any night in the week, Sundays excepted. Hats, parasols, perfumes, and face powders werenamed after her. It was Nellie here and Nellie there and Nellieeverywhere. The town was mad about her. It goes without saying thather husband was not the only man in love with her. 

As Harvey--let me see--oh, never mind--What's-His-Name--ambled upBroadway on the morning of his introduction into this homely narrativehe was smiled at most bewitchingly by his wife--from a hundredwindows--for Nellie's smile was never left out of the lithographs (henever missed seeing one of them, you may be sure)--but it neveroccurred to him to resent the fact that she was smiling in the sameinviting way to every other man who looked. 

He ambled on. At Forty-second Street he turned to the right, peeringat the curtained windows of the Knickerbocker with a sort of fearfullonging in his mild blue eyes, and kept on his way toward the GrandCentral Station. Although he had been riding in and out of the city ona certain suburban train for nearly two years and a half, he alwaysheaved a sigh of relief when the gate-tender told him he was takingthe right train for Tarrytown. Once in a great while, on matinée days, he came to town to luncheon with Nellie before the performance. OnSundays she journeyed to Tarrytown to see him and Phoebe. In that waythey saw quite a bit of each other. This day, however, he was takingan earlier train out, and he was secretly agitated over thepossibility of getting the wrong one. Nellie had sent word to thetheatre that she had a headache and could not have luncheon with him. 

He was not to come up to her apartment. If he had known a human beingin all New York with whom he could have had luncheon, he would havestayed in town and perhaps gone to a theatre. But, alas, there was noone! Once he had asked a low comedian, a former member of Nellie'scompany, but at the time out of a job and correspondingly meek, toluncheon with him at Rector's. At parting he had the satisfaction oflending the player eleven dollars. He hoped it would mean a long andpleasant acquaintance and a chance to let the world see something ofhim. But the low comedian fell unexpectedly into a "part" and did notremember Nellie's husband the next time he met him. He forgotsomething else as well. Harvey's memory was not so short. He neverforgot it. It rankled. 

He bought a noon extra and found a seat in the train. Then he sat upvery straight to let people see that they were riding in the same carwith the great Nellie Duluth's husband. Lucky dog! Every one wassaying that about him, he was sure. But every one else had a noonextra, worse luck!

After a while he sagged down into the seat and allowed his baby-blueeyes to fall into a brown study. In his mind's eye he was seeing athousand miles beyond the western bank of the Hudson, far off intothe quiet streets of a town that scarcely had heard the name of NellieDuluth and yet knew him by name and fame, even to the remotest nook ofit. 

They were good old days, sweet old days, those days when he wascourting her--when she was one among many and he the only one. Dayswhen he could serve customers in his shirt-sleeves and address eachone familiarly. Every one was kind. If he had a toothache, theysympathised with him and advised him to have it pulled and all thatsort of thing. In New York (he ground his teeth, proving that heretained them) no one cared whether he lived or died. He hated NewYork. He would have been friendly to New York--cheerfully, gladly--ifNew York had been willing to meet him halfway. It was friendly toNellie; why couldn't it be friendly to him? He was her husband. Why, confound it all, out in Blakeville, where they came from, he wassomebody while she was merely "that girl of Ted Barkley's. " He haddrawn soda water for her a hundred times and she had paid him inpennies! Only five years ago. Sometimes she had the soda watercharged; that is to say, she had it put on her mother's bill. Tedcouldn't get credit anywhere in town. 

And now look at her! She was getting six hundred dollars a week andspurned soda water as if it were poison. 

His chin dropped lower. The dreamy look deepened. 

"Doggone it, " he mused for the hundredth time, "I could have been apartner in the store by this time if I'd stuck to Mr. Davis. "

He was thinking of Davis' drug store, in Main Street, and the stripedblazer he wore while tending the soda fount in the summer time. A redand yellow affair, that blazer was. Before the "pharmacy law" wentinto effect he was permitted to put up prescriptions while Mr. Daviswas at meals. Afterward he was restricted to patent medicines, perfumes, soaps, toilet articles, cigars, razor strops, and all such, besides soda water in season. Moreover, when circuses came to town thereserved-seat sale was conducted in Davis' drug store. He always hadpasses without asking for them. 

Yes, he might have been a partner by this time. He drew a lot of tradeto the store. Mr. Davis could not have afforded to let him goelsewhere. 

Five years ago! It seemed ages. He was twenty-three when he leftBlakeville. Wasted ages! Somehow he liked the ready-made garments heused to buy at the Emporium much better than those he worenowadays--fashionable duds from Fifth Avenue at six times the price. He used to be busy from seven A. M. Till ten P. M. , and he was happy. Nowadays he had nothing to do but get up and shave and take Phoebe forwalks, eat, read the papers, tell stories to Phoebe, and go to bed. Tobe sure, the food was good and plentiful, the bed was soft, and thecottage more attractive than anything Blakeville could boast of;Phoebe was a joy and Nellie a jewel, but--heigh-ho! he might have beena partner in Davis' drug store if he'd stayed in the old town. 

The man in the seat behind was speaking to him. He came out of hisreverie with a glad rush. It was so unusual for any one to take theinitiative that he was more than ready to respond. 

"I see the Giants lost again yesterday, " said the volunteerconversationalist. 

"Yes. Six to four, " said our hero, brightly, turning in his seat. Healways read the baseball news. He could tell you the batting averageof every player in the big leagues for ten years back. 

"Lot of bone-heads, " said the other sourly. At first glance our friendthought he looked like an actor and his heart sank. But perhaps hemight be a travelling salesman. He liked them. In either event, thestranger's estimate of the New York ball team pleased him. He rejoicedin every defeat it sustained, particularly at the hands of theChicagos. 

"Not in it with the Cubs, " he announced, blitheness in his manner. Here was a man after his own heart. 

But the stranger glared at him. "The Cubs?" he said, his voicehardening, his manner turning aggressive. 

"They make the Giants look like two-spots, " went on our friend, recklessly. 

The stranger looked him over pityingly and then ended the conversationby deliberately hiding himself behind his newspaper. Our hero openedhis lips to add further comment, but something in the way the papercrackled caused him to close them and turn back to his bitter surveyof the Hudson. And the confounded fellow had invited his confidence, too!

He got down at Tarrytown and started up the hill. The station-masterpointed him out to a friend. 

"That's--er--What's-His-Name--Nellie Duluth's husband. "

"That guy?"

"She keeps him up here in a cottage to take care of the baby. Awayfrom the temptations of the city, " said the agent, with a broad wink. 

"I didn't know she was married, " said his friend, who lived inYonkers. 

"Well, she is. "

Mr. --(I declare, his name escapes me, so I will call him by hisChristian name, Harvey)--Harvey, utterly oblivious to the pityingscrutiny of the two men, moved slowly up the road, homeward bound. Hestopped in the middle of the sidewalk to light a "Sweet Cap, " threwback his unimposing shoulders, and accelerated his gait a trifle indeference to his position as the master of a celebrity. 

It was his habit to take a rather roundabout way up to the littlecottage on the hill. The route led him past a certain drug store anda grocer's where he was on speaking terms with the clerks. They knewhim. He did the marketing, but the account was in Miss Duluth's name. A livery stable, too, was on the line of progress. He occasionallystopped in to engage a pony phaeton for a drive in the afternoon withPhoebe. 

To-day he passed these places by. Every one seemed to be busy. Hecould see that at a glance. So there wasn't any use stopping. That waswhat he got for coming home from town in the middle of the day. Henodded to several acquaintances--passing acquaintances in both sensesof the word. They turned to look after him, half-smiles on theirlips. 

One woman said to another, "I wonder if he's really married to her?"

"If he wasn't, he'd be living in the city with her, " was the completerejoinder. 

"He seems such a quiet little man, so utterly unlike what a husband ofhers ought to be. He's from the far West--near Chicago, I believe. Inever can remember his name. Can you?"

"I've never heard it. "

"It's not an uncommon name. "

"Why doesn't he call himself Mr. Duluth?"

"My husband says actresses are not supposed to have husbands. If theyhave them, they keep them in the background. "

"That's true. I know I am always surprised when I see that they'retrying to get divorces. "

Harvey was never so far in the background as when he appeared in theforeground. One seldom took notice of him unless he was out of sight, or at least out of hearing. 

He was not effeminate; he was not the puerile, shiftless creature theforegoing sentences may have led you to suspect. He was simply aweakling in the strong grasp of circumstance. He could not helphimself; to save his life, he could not be anything but NellieDuluth's husband. 

Not a bad-looking chap, as men of his stamp go. Not much of a spine, perhaps, and a little saggy about the shoulders; all in all, rather acommon type. He kept his thin moustache twisted, but inconsistentlyneglected to shave for several days--that kind of a man. His trousers, no matter how well made, were always in need of pressing and his coatwas wrinkled from too much sitting on the small of his back. Hisshirts, collars, and neckties were clean and always "dressy. " Nelliesaw to that. Besides he always had gone in for gay colours when itcame to ties and socks. His watch-fob was a thing of weight andpre-eminence. It was of the bell-clapper type. In the summer time hewore suspenders with his belt, and in the winter time he wore a beltwith his suspenders. Of late he affected patent-leather shoes with redor green tops; he walked as if he despised the size of them. 

Arriving at the snug little cottage, he was brought face to face withone of the common tragedies of a housekeeper's life. The cook and thenursemaid, who also acted as waitress and chambermaid, had indulged inone of their controversies during his absence, and the former haddeparted, vowing she would never return. Here it was luncheon time andno one to get it! He knew that Bridget would be back before dinnertime--she always did come back--but in the meantime what were they todo? There wasn't a thing in the house. 

He found himself wishing he had stayed in the city for luncheon. 

Annie's story was a long one, but he gathered from it that Bridget waswholly to blame for the row. Annie was very positive as to that. 

"Have we any eggs?" asked the dismayed master. 

"Eggs? How should I know, sir?" demanded Annie. "It's Bridget's placeto know what's in the pantry, not mine. The Lord knows I have enoughto do without looking after her work. "

"Excuse me, " said he, apologetically. He hesitated for a moment andthen came to a decision. "I guess I'd better go and see what we'vegot. If we've got eggs, I can fry 'em. Bridget will be back thisevening. "

"I'm not so sure of that, " said Annie, belligerently. "I told her thiswas the last time, the very last. "

"I'll bet you a quarter she comes back, " said he, brightly. 

"Gee! What a sport you are!" scoffed Annie. 

He flushed. "Will you please set the table?"

"It's set. "

"Oh!"

"I'll help you make the toast, if you'd like, " said she, a suddenfeeling of pity for him coming into her niggardly soul. 

"Thanks, " he said, briskly. "And the tea, too?"

"I think we'd better have coffee, " said she, asserting a preferencefor the housemaid's joy. 

"Just as you say, " he acquiesced, hastily. "Where is Phoebe?"

"Next door with the Butler kids--children, I mean. Maybe they'll askher to stay to lunch. "

He gave her a surprise. "Go over and tell her to come home. I don'twant her staying to luncheon with those damned Butlers. "

She stared, open-mouthed. "I'm sure, sir, they're quite as good as--aswe are. What have you got against 'em?"

He could not tell her that Butler, who worked in a bank, never tookthe trouble to notice him except when Nellie was out to spend Sunday. 

"Never mind. Go and get Phoebe. "

He made a dash for the kitchen, and when the exasperated Anniereturned a few minutes later with Phoebe--rebellious Phoebe, who atthat particular moment hated her father--he was in his shirt-sleevesand aproned, breaking eggs over a skillet on the gas stove. His facewas very red, as if considerable exertion had been required. 

Phoebe was pouting when she came in, but the sight of her fathercaused her to set up a shriek of glee. 

"What fun, daddy!" she cried. "Now we'll never need Bridget again. Idon't like her. You will be our cook, won't you?"

Annie's sarcastic laugh annoyed him. 

"I used to do all the cooking when the Owl Club went camping, " heannounced, entirely for Annie's benefit. 

"In Blakeville?" asked Annie, with a grin. 

"Yes, in Blakeville, " he exploded, almost dropping the cigarette fromhis lips into the skillet. His blue eyes flashed ominously. Annie, unused to the turning of the worm, caught her breath. 

Suddenly obsessed by the idea that he was master in his own house, hebegan strutting about the kitchen, taking mental note of the thingsthat needed attention, with a view to reproving Bridget when she cameback to the fold. He burnt his fingers trying to straighten thestovepipe, smelt of the dish-cloths to see if they were greasy, rattled the pans and bethought himself of the eggs just in the nick oftime. In some haste and embarrassment he removed the skillet from thefire just as Annie came out of the pantry with the bread and thecoffee can. 

"Where's the platter?" he demanded, holding the skillet at arm'slength. "They're fried. "

"They'll be stone cold, " said she, "waiting for the coffee to boil. You ain't got any water boiling. "

"I thought, perhaps, we'd better have milk, " he said, gathering hiswits. 

To his surprise--and to her own, for that matter--she said, "Verygood, sir, " and repaired to the icebox for the dairy bottles. He wasstill holding the skillet when she returned. She was painfully red inthe face. 

Phoebe eyed the subsequent preparations for the meal with anincreasing look of sullenness in her quaint little face. She wasrather a pretty child. You would say of her, if you saw her in thestreet, "What a sweet child!" just as you would say it about the nextone you met. 

Her father, taking note of her manner, paused in the act of removinghis apron. 

"What's the matter, darling?"

"Can't I go over to Mrs. Butler's for luncheon?" she complained. "They're going to have chicken. "

"So are we, " said he, pointing to the eggs. 

"I want to go, " said Phoebe, stubbornly. 

He coloured. "Don't you want to stay home and eat what daddy hascooked?" he asked, rather plaintively. 

"I want to go. "

He could only resort to bribery. "And daddy'll take you down to seethe nickel show as soon as we've finished, " he offered. The child'sface brightened. 

Here Annie interposed. 

"She can't go to see them nickel shows; Miss Duluth won't stand forit. She's give me strict orders. "

"I'll take good care of her----" began Phoebe's father. 

"Miss Duluth's afraid of diphtheria and scarlet fever, " said Annie, resolutely, as she poured out a glass of milk for him. 

"Not likely to be any diphtheria this time of year, " he began again, spurred by the kick Phoebe planted on his kneecap. 

"Well, orders is orders. What Miss Duluth says goes. "

"Ah, come now, Annie----"

"Say, do you want her to ketch scarlet fever and die?" demanded thenurse, putting the bottle down and glaring at him with a look of mixedcommiseration and scorn. 

"Good Heavens, no!" he ejaculated. The very thought of it brought agush of cold water to his mouth. 

"Well, take her to see it if you must, but don't blame me. She's yourkid, " said Annie, meanly, with victory assured. 

"Make her say 'Yes, '" urged Phoebe, in a loud whisper. 

He hedged. "Do you want to have the scarlet fever?" he asked, dismally. 

"Yes, " said Phoebe. "And measles, too. "

The sound of heavy footsteps on the back porch put an end to thematter for the time being. Even Phoebe was diverted. 

Bridget had come back. A little ahead of her usual schedule, too, which was food for apprehension. Usually she took the whole day offwhen she left "for good and all. " Never before in the history of herconnection with Miss Duluth's menage had she returned so promptly. Involuntarily the master of the house glanced out of the window to seeif a rain had blown up. The sun was shining brightly. It wasn't theweather. 

The banging of the outer door to the kitchen caused him to jump everso slightly and to cast a glance of inquiry at Annie, who altered heroriginal course and moved toward the sitting-room door. In the kitchena perfectly innocent skillet crashed into the sink with a vigour thatwas more than ominous. 

A moment later Bridget appeared in the door. She wore her best hat andgloves and the dress she always went to mass in. The light of battlewas in her eye. 

"We--we thought we wouldn't wait, Bridget, " said Mr. --er--What's-His-Name, quickly. "You never come back till six or seven, you know, so----"

"Who's been monkeyin' wid my kitchen?" demanded Bridget. She startedto unbutton one of her gloves and the movement was so abrupt and sosuggestive that he got up from his chair in such a hurry that heoverturned it. 

"Somebody had to get lunch, " he began. 

"I wasn't sp'akin' to you, " said Bridget, glaring past him at Annie. 

He gulped suddenly. For the second time that day his eyes blazed. Things seemed to be dancing before them. 

"Well, I'm speaking to you!" he shouted, banging the table with hisclenched fist. 

"What!" squealed Bridget, staggering back in astonishment. 

He remembered Phoebe. 

"You'd better run over to the Butlers', Phoebe, and have lunch, " hesaid, his voice trembling in spite of himself. "Run along livelynow. "

Bridget was still staring at him like one bereft of her senses whenPhoebe scrambled down from her chair and raced out of the room. Heturned upon the cook. 

"What do you mean by coming in here and speaking to me in thatmanner?" he demanded, shrilly. 

"Great God above!" gasped Bridget weakly. She dropped her glove. Hereyes were blinking. 

"And why weren't you here to get lunch?" he continued, ruthlessly. "What do we pay you for?"

Bridget forgot her animosity toward Annie. "What do yez think o'that?" she muttered, addressing the nursemaid. 

"Get back to the kitchen, " ordered he. 

Cook had recovered herself by this time. Her broad face lost its stareand a deep scowl, with fiery red background, spread over her features. She imposed her huge figure a step or two farther into the room. 

"Phat's that?" she demanded. 

She weighed one hundred and ninety and was nearly six feet tall. Hewas barely five feet five and could not have tipped the beam at onehundred and twenty-five without his winter suit and overcoat. He movedback a corresponding step or two. 

"Don't argue, " he said, hurriedly. 

"Argue?" she snorted. "Phy, ye little shrimp, who are you to betalkin' back to me? For two cents I'd----"

"You are discharged!" he cried, hastily putting a chair in herpath--but wisely retaining a grip on it. 

She threw back her head and laughed, loudly, insultingly. Her broadhands, now gloveless and as red as broiled lobsters, foundresting-places on her hips. He allowed his gaze to take them in withone hurried, sweeping glance. They were as big and as menacing as aprizefighter's. 

"We'll discuss it when you're sober, " he made haste to say, trying towink amiably. 

"So help me Mike, I haven't touched a----" she began, but caughtherself in time. "So yez discharge me, do yez?" she shouted. 

"I understood you had quit, anyway. "

"Well, me fine little man, I'll see yez further before I'll quit now. I came back this minute to give notice, but I wouldn't do it now fortwenty-five dollars. "

"You don't have to give notice. You're discharged. Good-bye. " Hestarted for the sitting-room. 

She slapped the dining-table with one of her big hands. The dishesbounced into the air, and so did he. 

"I'll give this much notice to yez, " she roared, "and ye'll bear it inmind as long as yez stay in the same house wid me. I don't take noorders from the likes of you. I was employed by Miss Duluth. I cookfor her, I get me pay from her, and I'll not be fired by anybody buther. Do yez get that? I'd as soon take orders from the kid as fromyou, ye little pinhead. Who are yez anyhow? Ye're nobody. Begorry, Idon't even know yer name. Discharge me! Phy, phy, ye couldn'tdischarge a firecracker. What's that?"

"I--I didn't say anything, " he gasped. 

"Ye'd better not. "

"I shall speak to--to Miss Duluth about this, " he muttered, very redin the face. 

"Do!" she advised, sarcastically. "She'll tell yez to mind yer ownbusiness, the same as I do. The idee! Talkin' about firing me! Fer thelove av Mike, Annie, what do yez think av the nerve? Phy Miss Duluthkapes him on the place I can't fer the life av me see. She's thattinder-hearted she----"

But he had bolted through the door, slamming it after him. As hereached the bottom of the stairs leading to his bedroom the dooropened again and Annie called out to him:--

"Are you through lunch, sir?"

He was halfway up the steps before he could frame an answer. Tears ofrage and humiliation were in his baby-blue eyes. 

"Tell her to go to the devil, " he sputtered. 

As he disappeared at the bend in the stairs he distinctly heard Anniesay:--

"I can see myself doing it--not. "

For an hour he paced the floor of his little bed-chamber, fuming andswearing to himself in a mild, impotent fashion--and in some dread ofthe door. Such words and sentences as these fell from hislips:--"Nobody!" "Keeps me on the place!" "Because she'stender-hearted!" "I will fire her!" "Can't talk back to me!" "DamnedIrisher!" And so on and so forth until he quite wore himself out. Thenhe sat down at the window and let the far-away look slip back into histroubled blue eyes. They began to smart, but he did not blink them. 

Phoebe found him there at four when she came in for her nap. Hepromised to play croquet with her. 

Dinner was served promptly that evening, and it was the best dinnerBridget had cooked in a month. 

"That little talk of mine did some good, " said he to himself, as heselected a toothpick and went in to read "Nicholas Nickleby" tillbedtime. "They can't fool with me. "

He was reading Dickens. His wife had given him a complete set forChristmas. To keep him occupied, she said. 

CHAPTER II

MISS NELLIE DULUTH

Nellie Duluth had an apartment up near the Park, the upper end of thePark, in fact, and to the east of it. She went up there, she said, sothat she could be as near as possible to her husband and daughter. Besides, she hated taking the train at the Grand Central on Sundays. She always went to One Hundred and Twenty-fifth Street in her electricbrougham. It didn't seem so far to Tarrytown from One Hundred andTwenty-fifth. In making her calculations Nellie always went throughthe process of subtracting forty-two from one-twenty-five, seldomcorrectly. She had no difficulty in taking the two from the five, butit wasn't so simple when it came to taking four from two with one tocarry over. It was the one that confused her. For the life of her shecouldn't see what became of it. Figures of that sort were not in herline. 

Nellie's career had been meteoric. She literally had leaped from thechorus into the rôle of principal comédienne--one of those pranks offortune that cannot be explained or denied. She was one of the"Jack-in-the-Box" girls in a big New York production. On the openingnight, when the lid of her box flew open and she was projected intoplain view, she lost her bearings and missed the tiny platform incoming down. To save herself from an ignominious tumble almost to thefootlights she hopped off the edge of her box, where she had been"teetering" helplessly, and did a brief but exceedingly gracefullittle "toe spin, " hopping back into the box an instant later with allthe agility of a scared rabbit. She expected "notice" from the stagemanager for her inexcusable slip. 

But the spectators liked it. They thought it was in the play. She wasso pretty, so sprightly, so graceful, and so astoundingly modest thatthey wanted more of her. After the performance no fewer than a dozenmen asked the producer why he didn't give that little girl with theblack hair more of a chance. 

The next night she was commanded to repeat the trick. Then theypermitted her to do it over in the "encore. " Before the end of afortnight she was doing a dance with the comedian, exchanging lineswith him. Then a little individual song-and-dance specialty wasintroduced. At the close of the engagement on Broadway she announcedthat she would not sign for the next season unless given a "ripping"part and the promise to be featured. 

That was three years ago. Now she was the feature in the big, musicalcomedy success, "Up in the Air" and had New York at her feet. Thecritics admitted that she saved the "piece" in spite of composer andlibrettist. Some one is always doing that very thing for the poorwretches, Heaven pity them. 

Nellie was not only pretty and sprightly, but as clever as they makethem. She never drew the short straw. She had a brain that was quiteas active as her feet. It was not a very big brain; for that matter, her feet were tiny. She had the good sense to realise that her brainwould last longer than her feet, so she got as much for them as shecould while the applause lasted. She drove shrewd bargains with themanagers and shrewder ones with Wall Street admirers, who experienceda slim sense of gratification in being able to give her tips on themarket, with the assurance that they would see to it that she didn'tlose. 

She put her money into diamonds as fast as she got it. Some one in theprofession had told her that diamonds were safer than banks orrailroad bonds. She could get her interest by looking at them and shecould always sell them for what she paid for them. 

The card on the door of her cosey apartment bore the name, "MissNellie Duluth. "

There was absolutely nothing inside or outside the flat to lead one tosuspect that there was a Mr. Duluth. A husband was the remotest figurein her household. When the management concluded to put her name in theplay-bill, after the memorable Jack-in-the-Box leap, she was requestedto drop her married name, because it would not look well in print. 

"Where were you born?" the manager had asked. 

"Duluth. "

"Take Duluth for luck, " said he, and Duluth it was. She changed thebaptismal name Ella to Nellie. At home in Blakeville she had beencalled Eller or Ell. 

Her apartment was an attractive one. Her housemaid was a treasure. Shewas English and her name was Rachel. Nellie's personal maid anddresser was French. Her name was Rebecca. When Miss Duluth and Rebeccaleft the apartment to go to the theatre in the former's electricbrougham, Rachel put the place in order. So enormous was the task thatshe barely had it finished when her mistress returned, tired andsleepy, to litter it all up again with petticoats, stockings, roses, orchids, lobster shells, and cigarette stubs. More often thanotherwise Nellie brought home girls from the theatre to spend thenight with her. Poor things, they were chorus girls, just as she hadbeen, and they had so far to go. Besides, they served as excuses fordeclining unwelcome invitations to supper. Be that as it may, Rachelhad to clean up after them, finding their puffs, rats, and switches inthe morning and the telephone number at their lodgings in the middleof the night. She had her instructions to say that such young ladieswere spending the night with Miss Duluth. 

"If you don't believe it, call up Miss Duluth's number in thetelephone book, " she always concluded, as if the statement neededverification. 

Nellie had not been in Tarrytown for a matter of three weeks; whatwith rehearsals, revisions, consultations, and suppers, she justcouldn't get around to it. The next day after Harvey's ingloriousstand before Bridget she received a letter from him setting forth thewhole affair in a peculiarly vivid light. He said that something wouldhave to be done about Bridget and advised her to come out on theearliest day possible to talk it over with him. He confessed to ahesitancy about discharging the cook, recalling the trouble she hadexperienced in getting her away from a neighbour in the first place. But Bridget was drinking and quarrelling with Annie and using stronglanguage in the presence of Phoebe. He would have discharged her longago if it hadn't been for the fear of worrying her during rehearsalsand all that. She wasn't to be bothered with trifling householdsquabbles at such an important time as this. No, sir! Not if he couldhelp it. But, just the same, he thought she'd better come out and talkit over before Bridget took it into her head to poison some one. 

"I really, truly must go up to Tarrytown next Sunday, " said Nellie tothe select company supping in her apartment after the performance thatnight. "Harvey's going to discharge the cook. "

"Who is Harvey?" inquired the big blond man who sat beside her. 

"My teenty-weenty hubby, " said she, airily. 

There were two other men besides the big blond in the party, and thewife of one of them--a balance wheel. 

The big blond man stared at his hostess. He expected her to laugh ather own joke, but she did not. The others were discussing the relativemerits of the Packard and Peerless cars. He waited a moment and thenleaned closer to Nellie's ear. 

"Are you in earnest?" he asked, in low tones. 

"About what, Mr. Fairfax?"

"Hubby. Have you got one?"

"Of course I have. Had him for six years. Why?"

He swallowed hard. A wave of red crept up over his jowl and to thevery roots of his hair. 

"I've known you for over a month, Nellie, " he said, a hard light inhis fishy grey eyes, "and you've never mentioned this husband ofyours. What's the game?"

"It's a guessing game, " she said, coolly. "You might guess what I'mwearing this little plain gold ring on my left hand for. It's therewhere everybody can see it, isn't it? You just didn't take the troubleto look, Mr. Fairfax. Women don't wear wedding rings for a joke, letme tell you that. "

"I never noticed it, " he said, huskily. "The truth is, it neverentered my head to think you could be a married woman. "

"Thought I was divorced, eh?"

"Well, divorces are not uncommon, you know. You girls seem to get ridof husbands quite as easily as you pick them up. "

"Lord bless you, " said Nellie, in no way offended, "I have never doneanything to give Harvey cause for divorce, and I'm sure he's neverdone the tiniest thing out of the way. He never treats me cruelly, henever beats me, he doesn't get tight and break things up, and he neverlooks at other women. He's the nicest little husband ever. "

She instructed Rachel to fill up Mr. Fairfax's glass and pass the ripeolives. He was watching her, an odd expression in his eyes. A big, smooth-faced man of fifty was he, fat from high living, self-indulgence, and indolence, immaculately dressed to the tips ofhis toes. 

"Speaking of divorce, " she went on, without looking at him, "your wifedidn't have much trouble getting hers, I've heard. "

It was a daring thing to say, but Nellie was from the West, wherecourage and freshness of vision are regarded as the antithesis of tactand diplomacy. Tact calls for tact. The diplomatist is powerless ifyou begin shooting at him. Nellie did not work this out for herself;she merely wanted to put him in a corner where he would have to standand get it over with. 

Fairfax was disconcerted. He showed it. No one ever presumed todiscuss the matter with him. It was a very tender subject. His eyeswavered. 

"I like your cheek, " he growled. 

"Don't you like to talk about it?" she inquired, innocently. 

"No, " he replied, curtly. "It's nobody's business, Miss Duluth. "

"My, how touchy!" She shivered prettily. "I feel as if some one hadthrown a pail of ice water over me. "

"We were speaking of your--this husband of yours, " he said, quietly. "Why have you never mentioned him to me? Is it quite fair?"

"It just slipped my mind, " she said, in the most casual way. "Besides, I thought you knew. My little girl is four--or is it five?"

"Where do you keep them?"

"I've got 'em in storage up at Tarrytown. That's the Sleepy Hollowneighbourhood, isn't it? I guess that's why Harvey likes it so well. "

"What is his business?"

She looked up quickly. "What is that to you, Mr. Fairfax?"

"Nothing. I am in no way interested in Mr. Duluth. "

"His name isn't Duluth, " she flashed, hotly. "If you are notinterested in him, let's drop the subject. "

"I retract what I said. I am always interested in curiosities. What'she like?"

"Well, he's like a gentleman, if you are really interested incuriosities, " she said. 

He laughed. "By Jove, you've got a ready wit, my dear. " He looked ather reflectively, speculatively. "It's rather a facer to have you turnout to be a married woman. "

"Don't you like married women?"

"Some of 'em, " he answered, coolly. "But I don't like to think of youas married. "

"Pooh!" she said, and there was a world of meaning in the way she saidit. 

"Don't you know that it means a great deal to me?" he demanded, leaning closer and speaking in a lowered voice, tense and eager. 

"Pooh!" she repeated. 

He flushed again. "I cannot bear the thought of you belonging----"

She interrupted him quickly. "I wouldn't say it, if I were you. "

"But I must say it. I'm in love with you, Nellie, and you know it. Every drop of blood in my veins is crying out for you, and hasbeen----"

Her face had clouded. "I've asked you not to say such things to me. "

He stared in amazement. "You are dreaming! I've never uttered a wordof this sort to you. What are you thinking of? This is the first timeI've said----"

Nellie was dismayed. It was the first time he had spoken to her inthat way. She stammered something about "general principles, " but hewas regarding her so fixedly that her attempt at dissembling was mostunconvincing. 

"Or perhaps, " said he, almost savagely, but guardedly, "you areconfusing me with some one else. "

This was broad enough to demand instant resentment. She took refuge inthe opportunity. 

"Do you mean to insult me, Mr. Fairfax?" she demanded, coldly, drawingback in her chair. 

He laughed harshly. 

"Is there any one else?" he asked, gripping one of her small hands inhis great fist. 

She jerked the hand away. "I don't like that, Mr. Fairfax. Pleaseremember it. Don't ever do it again. You have no right to ask suchquestions of me, either. "

"I'm a fool to have asked, " he said, gruffly. "You'd be a fool toanswer. We'll let it go at that. So that's your wedding ring, eh? Oddthat I shouldn't have noticed it before. "

She was angry with herself, so she vented the displeasure on him. 

"You never took much notice of your wife's wedding ring, if tales aretrue. "

"Please, Miss Duluth, I----"

"Oh, I read all about the case, " she ran on. "You must have hated thenotoriety. I suppose most of the things she charged you with werelies. "

He pulled his collar away from his throat. 

"Is it too hot in the room?" she inquired, innocently. 

His grin was a sickly one. "Do you always make it so hot?" he asked. "This is my first visit to your little paradise, you must remember. Don't make it too hot for me. "

"It isn't paradise when it gets too hot, " was her safe comment. 

Fairfax's wife had divorced him a year or two before. The referee wasnot long in deciding the case in her favour. As they were leavingChambers, Fairfax's lawyer had said to his client:--"Well, we've savedeverything but honour. " And Fairfax had replied:--"You would havesaved that, too, if I had given you a free rein. " From which it may beinferred that Fairfax was something of a man despite his lawyer. 

He was one of those typical New Yorkers who were Pittsburgers orKansas Citians in the last incarnation--which dated back eight or tenyears, at the most, and which doesn't make any difference onBroadway--with more money than he was used to and a measurelesscapacity for spending. His wife had married him when money was anobject to him. When he got all the money he wanted he went to New Yorkand began a process of elevating the theatre by lending his presenceto the stage door. The stage declined to be elevated without the aidof an automobile, so he also lent that, and went soaring. His wifefurther elevated the stage by getting a divorce from him. 

"This is my first time here, " he went on, "but it isn't to be thelast, I hope. What good taste you have, Nellie! It's a corking littlenest. "

"I just can't go out to Tarrytown every night, " she explained. "I musthave a place in town. "

"By the way, " he said, more at ease than he had been, "you spoke ofgoing to Tarrytown on Sunday. Let me take you out in the motor. I'dlike to see this husband chap of yours and the little girl, if----"

"Nay, nay, " she said, shaking her head. "I never mix my public affairswith my private ones. You are a public affair, if there ever was one. No, little Nellie will go out on the choo-choos. " She laughedsuddenly, as if struck by a funny thought. Then, very seriously, shesaid:--"I don't know what Harvey would do to you if he caught you withme. "

He stiffened. "Jealous, eh?"

"Wildly!"

"A fire-eater?"

"He's a perfect devil, " said Nellie, with the straightest faceimaginable. 

Fairfax smiled in a superior sort of way, flecked the ashes from hiscigarette, and leaned back in his chair the better to contemplate thecharming creature at his side. He thoroughly approved of jealoushusbands. The fellow who isn't jealous, he argued, is the hardest totrifle with. 

"I suppose you adore him, " he said, with a thinly veiled sneer. 

"'He's the idol of me 'art, '" she sang, in gentle mimicry. 

"Lucky dog, " he whispered, leering upon her. "And how trustful he is, leaving you here in town to face temptation alone while he hibernatesin Tarrytown. "

"He trusts me, " she flashed. 

"I am the original 'trust buster, '" he laughed. 

Nellie arose abruptly. She stretched her arms and yawned. The trioopposite gave over disputing about automobiles, and both men looked attheir watches. 

"Go home, " said Nellie. "I'm tired. We've got a rehearsal to-morrow. "

No one took offence. They understood her ways. 

Fairfax gave her his light topcoat to hold while he slipped into it. She was vaguely surprised that he did not seek to employ the old trickof slipping an arm about her during the act. Somehow she felt a littlebit more of respect for him. 

"Don't forget to-morrow night, " he said, softly, at the door. "Justthe four of us, you know. I'll come back for you after the play. "

"Remember, it has to be in the main restaurant, " she warned him. "Ilike to see the people. "

He smiled. "Just as you like. "

She laughed to herself while Rebecca was preparing her for bed, tickled by the thought of the "fire-eating" Harvey. In bed, however, with the lights out, she found that sleep would not come as readily asshe had expected. Instead her mind was vividly awake and full ofreflections. She was thinking of the two in Tarrytown asleep for hoursand snugly complacent. Her thoughts suddenly leaped back to the olddays in Blakeville when she was the Town Marshal's daughter and he theall-important dispenser of soft drinks at Davis'. How she had hung onhis every word, quip, or jest! How she had looked forward to thenights when he was to call! How she hated the other girls who dividedwith her the attentions of this popular young beau! And how differenteverything was now in these days of affluence and adulation! Shecaught herself counting how many days it had been since she had seenher husband, the one-time hero of her dreams. What a home-body he was!What a change there was in him! In the old Blakeville days he was theliveliest chap in town. He was never passive for more than a minute ata stretch. Going, gadding, frivolling, flirting--that was the oldHarvey. And now look at him!

Those old days were far, far away, so far that she was amazed that shewas able to recall them. She had sung in the church choir and at allof the local entertainments. The praise of the Blakeville _Patriot_was as sweet incense to her, the placid applause of the mothers'meetings more riotous than anything she could imagine in these dayswhen audiences stamped and clapped and whistled till people in thestreets outside the theatre stopped and envied those who were inside. 

And then the days of actual courtship; she tried to recall how andwhen they began. She married Harvey in the little church on the hill. Everybody in town was there. She could close her eyes now and seeHarvey in the new checked suit he had ordered from Chicago especiallyfor the occasion, a splendid innovation that caused more than oneLotharial eye to gleam with envy. 

Then came the awakening. The popular drug clerk, for all his show ofprosperity and progress, had not saved a cent in all his years oflabour, nor was there any likelihood of his salary ever being largeenough to supply the wants of two persons. They went to live with hismother, and it was not long before he was wearing the checked suit for"everyday use" as well as for Sunday. 

She was stagestruck. For that matter, so was he. They were members ofthe town dramatic club and always had important parts in the plays. Aninstructor came from Chicago to drill the "members of the cast, " asthey were designated by the committee in charge. It was thisinstructor who advised Nellie to go to Chicago for a course in theschool he represented. He assured her she would have no difficulty ingetting on the stage. 

Harvey procured a position in a confectioner's establishment in StateStreet and she went to work for a photographer, taking her lessons indancing, singing, and elocution at odd hours. She was pretty, graceful, possessed of a lovely figure not above the medium height;dark-haired and vivacious after a fashion of her own. As her pleasedhusband used to say, she "got a job on the stage before you could sayJack Robinson. " He tried to get into the chorus with her, but themanagement said, "No husbands need apply. "

That was the beginning of her stage career, such a few years ago thatshe was amazed when she counted back. It seemed like ten years, notfive. 

She soared; he dropped, and, as there was no occasion for rousinghimself, according to the point of view established by both of them, he settled back into his natural groove and never got beyond hissoda-fountain days in retrospect. 

The next night after the little supper at Nellie's a most astonishingthing happened. A smallish man with baby-blue eyes appeared at thebox-office window, gave his name, and asked for a couple of good seatsin Miss Duluth's name. The ticket-seller had him repeat the name andthen gruffly told him to see the company manager. 

"I'm Miss Duluth's husband, " said the smallish man, shrinking. Thetall, flashily good-looking man at his elbow straightened up andlooked at him with a doubtful expression in his eyes. He was Mr. Butler, Harvey's next-door neighbour in Tarrytown. "You must be newhere. "

"Been here two years, " said the ticket-seller, glaring at him. "Seethe manager. "

"Where is he?"

"At his hotel, I suppose. Please move up. You're holding the lineback. "

At that moment the company's press representative sauntered by. Nellie's husband, very red in the face and humiliated, hailed him, andin three minutes was being conducted to a seat in the nineteenth row, three removed from the aisle, followed by his Tarrytown neighbour, onwhose face there was a frozen look of disgust. 

"We'll go back after the second act, " said Harvey, struggling with hishat, which wouldn't go in the rack sideways. "I'll arrange everythingthen. "

"Rotten seats, " said Mr. Butler, who had expected the front row or abox. 

"The scenery is always better from the back of the house, " explainedhis host, uncomfortably. 

"Damn the scenery!" said Mr. Butler. "I never look at it. "

"Wait till you see the setting in the second----" began Harvey, withforced enthusiasm, when the lights went down and the curtain waswhisked upward, revealing a score of pretty girls representing merrypeasants, in costumes that cost a hundred dollars apiece, andglittering with diamond rings. 

Mr. Butler glowered through the act. He couldn't see a thing, heswore. 

"I should think the husband of the star could get the best seats inthe house, " he said when the act was half-over, showing where histhoughts were. 

"That press agent hates me, " said Harvey, showing where his had been. 

"Hates you? In God's name, why?"

"I've had to call him down a couple of times, " said Harvey, confidentially. "Good and hard, too. "

"I suppose that's why he makes you take a back seat, " said Butler, sarcastically. 

"Well, what can a fellow do?" complained the other. "If I could haveseen Mr. --"

A man sitting behind tapped him on the shoulder. 

"Will you be good enough to stop talking while the curtain's up?" herequested, in a state of subdued belligerency. 

Harvey subsided without even so much as a glance to see what thefellow was like. 

After the act Butler suggested a drink, which was declined. 

"I don't drink, " explained Harvey. 

His companion snorted. "I'd like to know what kind of a supper we'regoing to have if you don't drink. Be a sport!"

"Oh, don't you worry about that, " said Harvey. "Ginger ale livens meup as much as anything. I used to simply pour the liquor down me. Ihad to give it up. It was getting the best of me. You should have seenthe way I was carrying on out there in Blakeville before----"

"Well, come out and watch me take a drink, " interrupted Butler, wearily. "It may brace you up. "

Harvey looked helplessly at the three ladies over whom they would haveto climb in order to reach the aisle and shook his head. 

"We're going out after the next act. Let's wait till then. "

"Give me my seat check, " said Butler, shortly. "I'm going out. "Receiving the check, he trampled his way out, leaving Harvey toruminate alone. 

The joint presence of these two gentlemen of Tarrytown in the cityrequires an explanation. You may remember that Nellie's husbandresented Butler's habit of ignoring him. Well, there had come a timewhen Butler had thought it advisable to get down from his high horse. His wife had gone to Cleveland to visit her mother for a week or two. It was a capital time for him to get better acquainted with MissDuluth, to whom he had been in the habit of merely doffing his hat inpassing. 

The morning of his wife's departure, which was no more than eighthours prior to their appearance at the box office, he made it a pointto hail Harvey in a most jovial manner as he stood on his side porch, suggesting that he come over and see the playroom he had fixed up forhis children and Phoebe. 

"We ought to be more neighbourly, " he said, as he shook hands withHarvey at the steps. Later on, as they smoked in the library, hementioned the fact that he had not had the pleasure of seeing MissDuluth in the new piece. 

Harvey was exalted. When any one was so friendly as all this to him hequite lost his head in the clouds. 

"We'll go in and see it together, " said he, "and have a bit of supperafterward. "

"That's very good of you, " said Butler, who was gaining his point. 

"When does Mrs. Butler return?" asked Harvey. 

Butler was startled. "Week or ten days. "

"Well, just as soon as she's back we'll have a little familyparty----"

His neighbour shook his head. "My wife's in mourning, " he said, nervously. 

"In mourning?" said Harvey, who remembered her best in rainbowcolours. 

"Yes. Her father. "

"Dead?"

"Certainly, " said Butler, a trifle bewildered. He coughed and changedthe current of conversation. It was not at all necessary to say thathis wife's father had been dead eleven years. "I thought something ofgoing in to the theatre to-night, " he went on. "Just to kill time. Itwill be very lonely for me, now that my dear wife's away. "

Harvey fell into the trap. "By jinks!" he exclaimed, "what's thematter with me going in, too? I haven't been in town at night for sixweeks or more. "

Butler's black eyes gleamed. 

"Excellent! We'll see a good play, have a bite to eat, and no one willknow what gay dogs we are. " He laughed and slapped Harvey on theback. 

"I'll get seats for Nellie's show if you'd like to see it, " saidHarvey, just as enthusiastically, except that he slapped the arm ofthe chair and peeled his knuckle on a knob he hadn't seen. 

"Great!"

"And say, I'd like you to know my wife better, Mr. Butler. If youdon't object I'll ask her to go out with us after the show forsomething to eat. "

"Permit me to remind you, Mr. --Mr. --er----"

"Call me Harvey, " said the owner of the name. 

"----to remind you that this is my party. I will play host and behonoured if your wife will condescend to join me--and you--at any hourand place she chooses. "

"You are most kind, " said Harvey, who had been mentally calculatingthe three one-dollar bills in his pocket. 

And that is how they came to be in the theatre that night. 

The curtain was up when Butler returned. He had had a drink. 

"Did you send a note back to your wife?" he asked as he sat down. 

"What for?"

"To tell her we are here, " hissed the other. 

"No, I didn't, " said Harvey, calmly. "I want to surprise her. "

Butler said something under his breath and was so mad during theremainder of the act that everybody on the stage seemed to be dressedin red. 

Miss Duluth did not have to make a change of costume between thesecond and third acts. It was then that she received visitors in herdressing-room. She had a sandwich and a glass of milk at that time, but was perfectly willing to send across the alley for bottled beer ifher callers cared to take anything so commonplace as that. 

She was sitting in her room, quite alone, with her feet cocked upon atrunk, nibbling a sandwich and thinking of the supper Fairfax was togive later on in the evening, when the manager of the company cametapping at her door. People had got in the habit of walking in uponher so unexpectedly that she issued an order for every one to knockand then made the injunction secure by slipping the bolt. Rebecca wentto the door. 

"Mr. Fairfax is here, mademoiselle, " she announced a moment later. "Mr. Ripton has brought him back and he wants to come in. " Except forthe word "mademoiselle" Rebecca spoke perfect English. 

Nellie took one foot down and then, thinking quickly, put it up again. It wouldn't hurt Fairfax, she argued, to encounter a littleopposition. 

"Tell Ripton I'm expecting some one else, " she said, at random. "IfMr. Fairfax wants to wait in the wings, I'll see him there. "

But she had not the slightest inkling of what was in store for her inthe shape of visitors. 

At that very moment Harvey and his friend were at the stage door, theformer engaged in an attempt at familiarity with the smilelessattendant. 

"Hello, Bob; how goes it?" said he, strutting up to the door. 

Bob's bulk blocked the passage. 

"Who d'you want to see?" he demanded, gruffly. 

"Who d'you suppose?" asked Harvey, gaily. 

"Don't get fresh, " snapped the door man, making as if to slam the irondoor in his face. Suddenly he recognised the applicant. "Oh, it's you, is it?"

"You must be going blind, Bobby, " said Harvey, in a fine effort atgeniality. "I'm taking a friend in to show him how it's done. Myfriend, Mr. Butler, Bob. "

Mr. Butler stepped on Harvey's toes and said something under hisbreath. 

"Is Miss Duluth expecting you, Mr. --er--Mr. --Is she?" asked old Bob. 

"No. I'm going to surprise her. "

Bob looked over his shoulder hastily. 

"If I was you, " he said, "I'd send my card in. She's--she's nervousand a shock might upset her. "

"She hasn't got a nerve in her body, " said Harvey. "Come on, Butler. Mind you don't fall over the braces or get hit by the scenery. "

They climbed a couple of steps and were in the midst of a small, bustling army of scene shifters and property men. Old Bob scratchedhis head and muttered something about "surprises. "

Three times Harvey tried to lead the way across the stage. Each timethey were turned back by perspiring, evil-minded stage hands whorushed at them with towering, toppling canvases. Once Harvey nearlysat down when an unobserving hand jerked a strip of carpet from underhis feet. A grand staircase almost crushed Mr. Butler on its way intoplace, and some one who seemed to be in authority shouted to him as hedodged:--

"Don't knock that pe-des-tal over, you pie face!"

At last they got safely over, and Harvey boldly walked up to thestar's dressing-room. 

"We're all right now, " he said to Butler, with a perceptible quaver inhis voice. "Just you wait while I go in and tell her I am here. "

Butler squeezed himself into a narrow place, where he seemed safefrom death, mopped his brow, and looked like a lost soul. 

Two men, sitting off to the left, saw Harvey try the locked door andthen pound rather imperatively. 

"Good Lord!" exclaimed one of them, staring. "It's--it's--er--What's-His-Name, Nellie's husband! Well, of all theinfernal----"

"That?" gasped Fairfax. 

"What in thunder is he doing here this time o' night! Great Scott, he'll spoil everything, " groaned Ripton, the manager. 

Harvey pounded again with no response. Nellie was sitting inside, mentally picturing the eagerness that caused Fairfax to comea-pounding like that. She had decided not to answer. 

Ripton called a stage hand. 

"Tell him that Nellie isn't seeing anybody to-night, " he whispered. "Do it quick. Get him out of here. "

"Shall I throw him out, sir?" demanded the man, with a wry face. "Poorlittle chap!"

"Just tell him that Nellie will see him for a few minutes after theplay. " Then, as the man moved away:--"They've got no business havinghusbands, Mr. Fairfax. Damned nuisances. "

Fairfax had his hand to his lips. He was thinking of Nellie's "perfectdevil. "

"I fancy he doesn't cut much of a figure in her life, " said he, in atone of relief. 

In the meantime the stage hand had accosted Harvey, who had beenjoined by the anxious Mr. Butler. 

"Miss Duluth ain't seeing any one to-night, sir, " he said. "She gavestrict orders. No one, sir. "

Harvey's blue eyes were like delft saucers. "She'll see me, " he said. "I'm her husband, you know. "

"I know that, sir. But the order goes, just the same. "

"Is she ill?"

"Yes, sir. Very ill, " said the man, quickly. 

Butler was gnawing his moustache. 

"Rubbish!" he said, sharply. "Come away, you. She's got a visitor inthere. Can't you see the lay of the land?"

The little husband turned cold, then hot. 

"A--a man visitor?"

"Certainly, " snapped the aggrieved Mr. Butler. "What else?"

Without another word, Harvey brushed past the stage hand and beganrattling the door violently. 

"Nellie!" he shouted, his lips close to the paint. 

In a second the door flew open and the astonished actress stood therestaring at him as if he were a ghost. He pushed the door wide open andstrode into the dressing-room, Nellie falling back before him. Theroom was empty save for the dismayed Rebecca. 

"There!" he exclaimed, turning to address Butler in the doorway, butButler was not there. The stage hand had got in his way. 

"Wha--what, in the name of Heaven, are you doing here, Harvey?" gaspedNellie. 

"How are you, Nell? Nothing serious, I hope. "

"Serious?" she murmured, swallowing hard, her wits in the wind. 

"Ain't you ill?"

"Never was better in my life, " she cried, seeing what she thought waslight. "Who brought you to town with such a tale as that? I'm fine. You've been fooled. If I were you, I'd take the first train out andtry to find out who----"

"It's all right, Butler, " he called out. "Come right in. Hello! Whereare you?" He stepped to the door and looked out. Mr. Butler was beingconducted toward the stage door by the burly stage hand. He was tryingto expostulate. "Hi! What you doing?" shouted Harvey, darting afterthem. "Let my friend alone!"

Up came Ripton in haste. 

"O'Brien, what do you mean? Take your hand off that gentleman'sshoulder at once. He is a friend of Mr. --Mr. --ahem! A terriblemistake, sir. "

Then followed a moment of explanation, apology, and introduction, after which Harvey fairly dragged his exasperated friend back toNellie's room. 

She was still standing in the middle of the room trying to collect herwits. 

"You remember Mr. Butler, deary, " panted Harvey, waving his hand. Nellie gasped in the affirmative. 

At that instant Fairfax's big frame appeared in the door. He wasgrinning amiably. She glared at him helplessly for a moment. 

"Won't you introduce me to your husband?" he said, suavely. 

Nellie found her tongue and the little man shook hands with the bigone. 

"Glad to meet you, " said Harvey. 

"I am glad to see you, " said Fairfax, warmly. 

"My friend Butler, " introduced Harvey. 

Mr. Butler was standing very stiff and pallid, with one knee proppedagainst a chair. There was a glaze over his eyes. Fairfax grinnedbroadly. 

"Oh, Butler and I are old acquaintances, " said he. "Wife out of town, Butler?"

"Sure, " said Harvey, before Butler could reply. "And we're in town tosee the sights. Eh, Butler?"

Butler muttered something that sounded uncommonly like "confoundedass, " and began fanning himself with his derby hat and gloves andwalking-stick, all of which happened to be in the same hand. 

"We're going to take Nellie--I mean Miss Duluth--out for supper afterthe play, " went on Harvey, glibly. "We'll be waiting for you, dearie. Mr. Butler is doing the honours. By the way, Butler, I think it wouldbe nicer if Nellie could suggest an odd lady for us. We ought to havefour. Do you know of any one, Nell? By George, we've got to have apretty one, though. We insist on that, eh, Butler?" He jabbed Butlerin the ribs and winked. 

"Don't do that!" said the unhappy Mr. Butler, dropping his stick. Itrolled under a table and he seized the opportunity thus providentiallypresented. He went down after it and was lost to view for aconsiderable length, of time, hiding himself as the ostrich does whenit buries its head in the sand and imagines it is completely out ofsight. 

Nellie's wits were returning. She was obliged to do some rapid andclever thinking. Fairfax was watching her with a sardonic smile on hislips. Ripton, the manager, peered over his shoulder and winkedviolently. 

"Oh, Harvey dear, " she cried, plaintively, "how disappointed I am. Ihave had strict orders from the doctor to go straight home to bedafter every performance. I really can't go with you and Mr. Butlerto-night. I wish you had telephoned or something. I could have toldyou. "

Harvey looked distressed. "What does the doctor say it is?"

[Illustration: Copyright, 1911, by Dodd, Mead & CompanyFairfax was sitting on a trunk, a satisfied smile on his lips]

"My heart, " she said, solemnly. 

"Don't you think you could go out for a--just a sandwich and a bottleof beer?" he pleaded, feeling that he had wantonly betrayed hisfriendly neighbour. 

"Couldn't think of it, " she said. "The nurse will be here at eleven. I'll just have to go home. He insists on absolute quiet for me and I'mon a dreadful diet. " A bright thought struck her. "Do you know, I haveto keep my door locked so as not to be startled by----"

The sharp, insistent voice of the callboy broke in on her flow ofexcuses. 

"There! I'll have to go on in a second. The curtain's going up. Good-night, gentlemen. Good-night, Harvey dear. Give me a kiss. "

She pecked at his cheek with her carmine lips. 

"Just half an hour at some quiet little restaurant, " he was sayingwhen she fled past him toward the stage. 

"Sorry, dear, " she called, then stopped to speak to Mr. Butler. "Thank you so much, Mr. Butler. Won't you repeat the invitation sometime later on? So good of you to bring Harvey in. Bring Mrs. Butler insome night, and if I'm better we will have a jolly little spree, justthe four of us. Will you do it?"

She beamed on him. Butler bowed very low and said:--

"It will give me great pleasure, Miss Duluth. "

"Good-night, then. "

"Good-night. "

When she returned to her dressing-room later on, she found Fairfaxthere, sitting on a trunk, a satisfied smile on his lips. She left thedoor open. 

Mr. Ripton conducted the two men across to the stage door, leadingthem through the narrow space back of the big drop. Chorus girls threwkisses at Harvey; they all knew him. He winked blandly at Butler, whowas staring straight before him. 

"A great life, eh?" said Harvey, meaning that which surrounded them. They were in the alley outside the stage door. 

"I'm going to catch the ten-twenty, " said Butler, jamming his hat downfirmly. 

"Ain't you going to see the last act?" demanded the other, dismayed. 

Butler lifted his right hand to heaven, and, shaking it the better toexpress the intensity of his declaration, remarked:--

"I hope somebody will kick me all over town if I'm ever caught beingsuch a damned fool as this again. I honestly hope it! I've been maderidiculous--a blithering fool! Why, you--you----" He paused in hisrage, a sudden wave of pity assailing him. "By George, I can't helpfeeling sorry for you! Good-night. "

Harvey hurried after him. 

"I guess I'll take it, too. That gets us out at eleven-thirty. We canget a bite to eat in the station, I guess. "

He had to almost trot to keep pace with Butler crossing to the GrandCentral. Seated side by side in the train, and after he had recoveredhis breath a bit, he said:--

"Confound it, I forgot to ask Nellie if it will be wise for her tocome out on Sunday. The heart's a mighty bad thing, Butler. "

"It certainly is, " said Butler, with unction. 

At the station in Tarrytown he said "Good-night" very gruffly andhurried off to jump into the only cab at the platform. He had heardall about Blakeville and the wild life Harvey had led there, and hewas mad enough to fight. 

"Good-night, Mr. Butler, " said Harvey, as the hack drove off. 

He walked up the hill. 

CHAPTER III

MR. FAIRFAX

He found the nursemaid up and waiting for him. Phoebe had a "dreadfulthroat" and a high temperature. It had come on very suddenly, itseems, and if Annie's memory served her right it was just the waydiphtheria began. The little girl had been thrashing about in the bedand whimpering for "daddy" since eight o'clock. His heart sank likelead, to a far deeper level than it had dropped with the basedesertion of Butler. Filled with remorse, he ran upstairs withouttaking off his hat or overcoat. The feeling of resentment towardButler was lost in this new, overpowering sense of dread; thediscovery of his own lamentable unfitness for "high life" expeditionsfaded into nothingness in the face of this possible catastrophe. Whatif Phoebe were to die? He would be to blame. He remembered feelingthat he should not have left her that evening. It had been apremonition, and this was to be the price of his folly. 

At three in the morning he went over to rouse the doctor, all the timethinking that, even if he were capable of forgiving himself forPhoebe's death, Nellie would always hold him responsible. The doctorrefused to come before eight o'clock, and slammed the door in thedisturber's face. 

"If she dies, " he said to himself over and over again as he trudgedhomeward, "I'll kill that beast of a doctor. I'll tear his heartout. "

The doctor did not come till nine-thirty. They never do. He at oncesaid it was a bad attack of tonsilitis, and began treatment on thestomach. He took a culture and said he would let Mr. --Mr. What's-His-Name know whether there was anything diphtheritic. In themeantime, "Take good care of her. "

Saturday morning a loving note came from Nellie, deploring the factthat she couldn't come out on Sunday after all. The doctor said shemust save her strength. She instructed Harvey to dismiss Bridget andget another cook at once. But Harvey's heart had melted towardBridget. The big Irishwoman was the soul of kindness now that heremployer was in distress. 

About nine o'clock that morning a man came up and tacked a placard onthe door and informed the household that it was in quarantine. Harveywent out and looked at the card. Then he slunk back into Phoebe's roomand sat down, very white and scared. 

"Do you think she'll die?" he asked of the doctor when that gentlemancalled soon afterward. He was shivering like a leaf. 

"Not necessarily, " said the man of medicine, calmly. "Diphtheria isn'twhat it used to be. "

"If she dies I'll jump in the river, " said the little father, bleakly. 

"Nonsense!" said the doctor. "Can you swim?" he added, whimsically. 

"No, " said Harvey, his face lighting up. 

The doctor patted him on the back. "Brace up, sir. Has the child amother?"

Harvey stared at him. "Of course, " he said. "Don't you know whosechild you are 'tending?"

"I confess I--er--I----"

"She is the daughter of Nellie Duluth. "

"Oh!" fell from the doctor's lips. "And you--you are Miss Duluth'shusband? I didn't quite connect the names. "

"Well, I'm her husband, name or no name, " explained the other. "Isuppose I ought to send for her. She ought to know. "

"Are you--er--separated?"

"Not at all, " said Harvey. "I maintain two establishments, that's all. One here, one in the city. "

"Oh, I see, " said the doctor, who didn't in the least see. "Of course, she would be subject to quarantine rules if she came here, Mr. --Mr. --ahem!"

"They couldn't get along without her at the theatre, " groaned thehusband. 

"I'd suggest waiting a day or two. Believe me, my dear sir, the childwill pull through. I will do all that can be done, sir. Rest easy. "His manner was quite different, now that he knew the importance of hispatient. He readjusted his glasses and cleared his throat. "I hope tohave the pleasure of seeing Mrs. --er--your wife, sir. "

"She has a regular physician in town, " said Harvey, politely. 

For two weeks he nursed Phoebe, day and night, announcing to thedoctor in the beginning that his early training made him quitecapable. There were moments when he thought she was dying, but theypassed so quickly that his faith in the physician's assurances roseabove his fears. Acting on the purely unselfish motive that Nelliewould be upset by the news, he kept the truth from her, and she wenton singing and dancing without so much as a word to distress her. TwoSundays passed; her own lamentable illness kept her away from thelittle house in Tarrytown. 

"If we tell her about Phoebe, " said Harvey to Bridget and Annie, "she'll go all to pieces. Her heart may stop, like as not. Besides, she'd insist on coming out and taking care of her, and that would befatal to the show. She's never had diphtheria. She'd be sure to catchit. It goes very hard with grown people. "

"Have you ever had it, sir?" asked Annie, anxiously. 

"Three times, " said Harvey, who hadn't thought of it up to thatmoment. 

When the child was able to sit up he put in his time reading "DavidCopperfield" to her. 

Later on he played "jacks" with her and cut pictures out of the comicsupplements. By the end of the month he was thinner and more "peaked, "if anything, than she. Unshaven, unshorn, unpressed was he, but he wastoo full of joy to give heed to his own personal comforts orrequirements. 

His mind was beginning to be sorely troubled over one thing. Now thatPhoebe was well and getting strong he realised that Nellie would befurious when she found out how ill the child had been and how she hadbeen deceived. He considered the advisability of keeping it from heraltogether, swearing every one to secrecy, but there was the doctor'sbill to be paid. When it came to paying that Nellie would demand anexplanation. It was utterly impossible for him to pay it himself. Thinking over his unhappy position, he declared, with a great amountof zeal, but no vigour, that he was going to get a job and beindependent once more. More than that, when he got fairly wellestablished in his position (he rather leaned toward the drug or therestaurant business) he would insist on Nellie giving up her arduousstage work and settling down to enjoy a life of comfort andease--even luxury, if things went as he meant them to go. 

One afternoon late in October, when the scarlet leaves were blowingacross his little front yard and the screens had been taken from thewindows, a big green automobile stopped at his gate and a tall man gotout and came briskly up the walk. Harvey was sitting in the libraryhelping Phoebe with her ABC's when he caught sight of the visitorcrossing the porch. 

"Gentleman to see you, " said Annie, a moment later. 

"Is it the butcher's man? I declare, I must get in and attend to thatlittle account. Tell him I'll be in, Annie. "

"It ain't the butcher. It's a swell. "

Harvey got up, felt of the four days' growth of beard on his chin, andpondered. 

"Did he give his name?"

"Mr. Fairfax, he said. "

He remembered Fairfax. His hand ran over his chin once more. 

"Tell him to come in. I'll be down in fifteen minutes. "

He went upstairs on the jump and got his razor out. He was nervous. Only that morning he had written to Nellie telling her of Phoebe'sexpensive illness and of her joyous recovery. The doctor's bill wasninety dollars. He cut himself in three places. 

Fairfax was sitting near the window talking with Phoebe when heclattered downstairs ten minutes later, deploring the cuts but pleasedwith himself for having broken all records at shaving. The big NewYorker had a way with him; he could interest children as well as theirmothers and grown sisters. Phoebe was telling him about "Jack theGiant Killer" when her father popped into the room. 

"Phoebe!" he cried, stopping short in horror. 

Fairfax arose languidly. 

"How do you do, Mr. --ah--ahem! The little girl has been playinghostess. The fifteen minutes have flown. "

"Ten minutes by my watch, " said Harvey, promptly. "Phoebe, dear, wheredid you get that awful dress--and, oh, my! those dirty hands? Where'sAnnie? Annie's the nurse, Mr. Fairfax. Run right away and tell her tochange that dress and wash your hands. How do you do, Mr. Fairfax?Glad to see you. How are you?"

He advanced to shake the big man's hand. Fairfax towered over him. 

"I was afraid you would not remember me, " said Fairfax. 

"Run along, Phoebe. She's been very ill, you see. We don't make lifeany harder for her than we have to. Washing gets on a child's nerves, don't you think? It used to on mine, I know. Of course I remember you. Won't you sit down? Annie! Oh, Annie!"

He called into the stair hallway and Annie appeared from thedining-room. 

"Ann--Oh, here you are! How many times must I tell you to put a cleandress on Phoebe every day? What are her dresses for, I'd like toknow?" He winked violently at Annie from the security of the portière, which he held at arm's length as a shield. Annie arose to the occasionand winked back. 

"May I put on my Sunday dress?" cried Phoebe, gleefully. 

"Only one of 'em, " said he, in haste. "Annie will pick out one foryou. "

Considerably bewildered, Phoebe was led away by the nurse. 

"She's a pretty child, " said Fairfax. If his manner was a triflestrained Harvey failed to make note of it. "Looks like her mother. "

"I'm glad you think so, " said the father, radiantly. "I'd hate to haveher look like me. "

Fairfax looked him over and suppressed a smile. 

"She is quite happy here with you, I suppose, " he said, taking achair. 

"Yes, sir-ree. "

"Does she never long to be with her mother?"

"Well, you see, " said Harvey, apologising for Nellie, "she doesn't seemuch of Miss--of her mother these days. I guess she's got kind of usedto being with me. Kids are funny things, you know. "

"She seems to have all the comforts and necessities of life, " said thebig man, looking about him with an affectation of approval. 

"Everything that I can afford, sir, " said Harvey, blandly. 

"Have you ever thought of putting her in a nice school for----"

"She enters kindergarten before the holidays, " interrupted thefather. 

"I mean a--er--sort of boarding school, " put in the big man, uneasily. "Where she could be brought up under proper influences, polished up, so to speak. You know what I mean. Miss Duluth has often spoken ofsuch an arrangement. In fact, her heart seems to be set on it. "

"You mean she--she wants to send her away to school?" asked Harvey, blankly. 

"It is a very common and excellent practice nowadays, " said the other, lamely. 

The little man was staring at him, his blue eyes full of dismay. 

"Why--why, I don't believe I'd like that, " he said, grasping the armsof his chair with tense fingers. "She's doing all right here. It'shealthy here, and I am sure the schools are good enough. Nellie hasnever said anything to me about boarding school. Why--why, Mr. Fairfax, Phoebe's only five--not quite that, and I--I think it wouldbe cruel to put her off among strangers. When she's fifteen orsixteen, maybe, but not now. Nellie don't mean that, I'm sure. "

"There is a splendid school for little girls up in Montreal--a sort ofconvent, you know. They get the best of training, moral, spiritual, and physical. It is an ideal life for a child. Nellie has beenthinking a great deal of sending her there. In fact, she haspractically decided to----"

Harvey came to his feet slowly, dizzily. 

"I can't believe it. She wouldn't send the poor little thing up thereall alone; no, sir! I--I wouldn't let her do it. " He was pacing thefloor. His forehead was moist. 

"Miss Duluth appreciates one condition that you don't seem able tograsp, " said Fairfax, bluntly. "She wants to keep the child as farremoved from stage life and its environments as possible. She wantsher to have every advantage, every opportunity to grow up entirely outof reach of the--er--influences which now threaten to surround her. "

Harvey stopped in front of him. "Is this what you came out here for, Mr. Fairfax? Did Nellie tell you to do this?"

"I will be perfectly frank with you. She asked me to come out and talkit over with you. "

"Why didn't she come herself?"

"She evidently was afraid that you would overrule her in the matter. "

"I never overruled her in my life, " cried Harvey. "She isn't afraid ofme. There's something else. "

"I can only say, sir, that she intends to put the child in the conventbefore Christmas. She goes on the road after the holidays, " saidFairfax, setting his huge jaw. 

Harvey sat down suddenly, limp as a rag. His mouth filled withwater--a cold, sickening moisture that rendered him speechless for amoment. He swallowed painfully. His eyes swept the little room as ifin search of something to prove that this was the place forPhoebe--this quiet, happy little cottage of theirs. 

"Before Christmas?" he murmured. 

"See here, Mr. --ah--Mr. , here is the situation in a nutshell:--Nelliedoesn't see why she should be keeping up two establishments. It'sexpensive. The child will be comfortable and happy in the convent andthis house will be off her hands. She----"

"Why don't she give up her flat in town?" demanded Harvey, miserably. "That's where the money goes. "

"She expects to give it up the first of the year, " said Fairfax. "Theroad tour lasts till May. She is going to Europe for the summer. "

"To Europe?" gasped Harvey, feeling the floor sink under his feet. 

He did not think to inquire what was to become of him in the newarrangement. 

"She needs a sea voyage, travel--a long vacation, in fact. It is fullydecided. So, you see, the convent is the place for Phoebe. "

"But where do I come in?" cried the unhappy father. "Does she thinkfor a minute that I will put my child in a convent so that we may befree to go to Europe and do things like that? No, sir! Dammit, I won'tgo to Europe and leave Phoebe in a----"

Fairfax was getting tired of the argument. Moreover, he wasuncomfortable and decidedly impatient to have it over with. He cut inrather harshly on the other's lamentations. 

"If you think she's going to take you to Europe, you're very muchmistaken. Why, man, have you no pride? Can't you understand what adamned useless bit of dead weight you are, hanging to her neck?"

It was out at last. Harvey sat there staring at him, very still; sucha pathetic figure that it seemed like rank cowardice to strike again. And yet Fairfax, now that he had begun, was eager to go on strikingthis helpless, inoffensive creature with all the frenzy of the brutalvictor who stamps out the life of his vanquished foe. 

"She supports you. You haven't earned a dollar in four years. I haveit from her, and from others. It is commonly understood that you won'twork, you won't do a stroke toward supporting the child. You are aleech, a barnacle, a--a--well, a loafer. If you had a drop of realman's blood in you, you'd get out and earn enough to buy clothes foryourself, at least, and the money for a hair cut or a shoe shine. Shehas been too good to you, my little man. You can't blame her forgetting tired of it. The great wonder is that she has stood for it solong. "

Words struggled from Harvey's pallid lips. 

"But she loves me, " he said. "It's all understood between us. I gaveher the start in life. She will tell you so. I----"

"You never did a thing for her in your life, " broke in the big man, harshly. He was consumed by an ungovernable hatred for this little manwho was the husband of the woman he coveted. 

"I've always wanted to get a job. She wouldn't let me, " protestedHarvey, a red spot coming into each of his cheeks. "I don't want totake the money she earns. I never have wanted to. But she says myplace is here at home, with Phoebe. Somebody's got to look after thechild. We've talked it over a----"

"I don't want to hear about it, " snapped Fairfax, hitting the arm ofhis chair with his fist. "You're no good, that's all there is to it. You are a joke, a laughing stock. Do you suppose that she can possiblylove a man like you? A woman wants a man about her, not the caricatureof one. "

"I intend to get a job as soon as----" began Harvey, as if he had notheard a word his visitor was saying. 

"Now, see here, " exclaimed Fairfax, coming to his feet. "I'm a man offew words. I came out here to make you a proposition. It is betweenyou and me, and no one need be the wiser. I'm not such a fool as tointrust a thing of this kind to an outsider. Is there any likelihoodof any one hearing us?"

Nellie's husband shrank lower into his chair and shook his head. Heseemed to have lost the power of speech. Fairfax drew a chair upcloser, however, and lowered his voice. 

"You've got a price. Men of your type always have. I told Nellie Iwould see you to-day. I'll be plain with you. She's tired of you, ofthis miserable attachment. You are impossible. That's settled. Wewon't go into that. Now I'm here, man to man, to find out how much youwill take and agree to a separation. "

Harvey stiffened. He thought for a moment that his heart had stoppedbeating. 

"I don't believe I understand, " he muttered. 

"Don't you understand the word 'separation'?"

"Agree to a separation from what? Great God, you don't mean aseparation from Phoebe?"

"Don't be a fool! Use your brain, if you've got one. "

"Do--you--mean--Nellie?" fell slowly, painfully from the dry lips ofthe little man in the Morris chair. 

"Certainly. "

"Does she want to--to leave me?" The tears started in his big blueeyes. He blinked violently. 

"It has come to that. She can't go on as she has been going. It'sridiculous. You are anxious to go back to Blakeville, she says. Well, that's where you belong. Somebody's drug store out there you'd like toown, I believe. Now, I am prepared to see that you get that drug storeand a matter of ten or twenty thousand dollars besides. Money meansnothing to me. All you have to do is to make no answer to the chargesshe will bring----"

Harvey leaped to his feet with a cry of abject pain. 

"Did she send you here to say this to me?" he cried, shrilly, hisfigure shaking with suppressed fury. 

"No, " said Fairfax, involuntarily drawing back. "This is between youand me. She doesn't know----"

"Then, damn you!" shrieked Harvey, shaking his fist in the big man'sface, "what do you mean by coming here like this? What do you think Iam? Get out of here! I'm a joke, am I? Well, I'll show you and her andeverybody else that I'm a hell of a joke, let me tell you that! I wasgood enough for her once. I won her away from every fellow inBlakeville. I can do it again. I'll show you, you big bluffer! Now, get out! Don't you ever come here again, and--don't you ever go nearmy wife again!"

Fairfax had arisen. He was smiling, despite his astonishment. 

"I fancy you will find you can't go so far as that, " he sneered. 

"Get out, or I'll throw you out!"

"Better think it over. Twenty-five thousand and no questions asked. Take a day or two to think----"

With a shriek of rage Harvey threw himself at the big man, strikingout with all his might. Taken by surprise, Fairfax fell away beforethe attack, which, though seemingly impotent, was as fierce as that ofa wildcat. 

The New Yorker was in no danger. He warded off the blows with ease, all the time imploring the infuriated Harvey to be sensible, to becalm. But with a heroism born of shame and despair the little manswung his arms like windmills, clawing, scratching, until the airseemed full of them. Fairfax's huge head was out of reach. In hisblind fury Harvey did not take that into account. He struck at it withall the power in his thin little arms, always falling so far shortthat the efforts were ludicrous. 

Fairfax began to look about in alarm. The noise of the conflict wassure to attract the attention of the servants. He began backing towardthe doorway. Suddenly Harvey changed his fruitless tactics. He drovethe toe of his shoe squarely against the shinbone of the big man. Witha roar of rage Fairfax hurled himself upon the panting foe. 

"I'll smash your head, you little devil, " he roared, and struck outviciously with one of his huge fists. 

The blow landed squarely on Harvey's eye. He fell in a heap severalfeet away. Half-dazed, he tried to get to his feet. The big man, allthe brute in him aroused, sprang forward and drove another savage blowinto the bleak, white face of the little one. Again he struck. Then helifted Harvey bodily from the floor and held him up against the wall, his big hand on his throat. 

"How do you like it?" he snarled, slapping the helpless, half-conscious man in the face with his open hand--loud, stingingblows that almost knocked the head off the shoulders. "Will you agreeto my proposition now?"

From Harvey's broken lips oozed a strangled--

"No!"

Fairfax struck again and then let him slide to the floor. 

"You damned little coward!" he grated. "To kick a man like that!"

He rushed from the room, grabbed his hat and coat in the hall, and wasout of the house like a whirlwind. 

The whir of a motor came vaguely, indistinctly to Harvey's ears. Hewas lying close to the window. As if in a dream he lifted himselffeebly to his knees and looked out of the window, not knowing exactlywhat he did nor why he did it. 

A big green car was leaving his front gate. He was a long time inrecalling who came up in it. 

His breath was coming slowly. He tried to speak, but a strange, unnatural wheeze came from his lips. A fit of coughing followed. Atlast he got upon his feet, steadying himself against the windowcasing. For a long time he stood there, working it all out in hisdizzy, thumping brain. 

He put his hand to his lips and then stared dully at the stains thatcovered it when he took it away. Then it all came back to him with arush. Like a guilty, hunted thing he slunk upstairs to his room, carefully avoiding the room in which Phoebe was being bedecked in herSunday frock. Her high, shrill voice came to his ears. He was weepingbitterly, sobbing like a whipped child. 

He almost fainted when he first peered into the mirror on his bureau. His eyes were beginning to puff out like great knobs, his face andshirt front were saturated with his own plucky blood. Plucky! The wordoccurred to him as he looked. Yes, he had been plucky. He didn't knowit was in him to be so plucky. A sort of pride in himself arose tooffset the pain and mortification. Yes, he had defended his honour andNellie's. She should hear of it! He would tell her what he had doneand how Fairfax had struck him down with a chair. She would then denyto him that she had said those awful things about him. She would beproud of him!

Carefully he washed his hands and face. With trembling fingers heapplied court-plaster to his lips, acting with speed because his eyeswere closing. Some one had told him that raw beefsteak was good forblack eyes. He wondered if bacon would do as well. There was nobeefsteak in the house. 

His legs faltered as he made his way to the back stairs. Bridget wascoming up. She started back with a howl. 

"Come here, Bridget, " he whispered. "Into my room. Be quick!" Heretreated. He would employ her aid and swear her to secrecy. The Irishknow a great deal about fighting, he reflected. 

"In the name av Hivvin, sor, what has happened to yez?" whisperedBridget, aghast in the doorway. 

"Come in and I'll tell you, " said he, with a groan. 

Presently a childish voice came clamouring at the locked door. Heheard it as from afar. Bridget paused in her ministrations. He hadjust said:--

"I will take boxing lessons and physical culture of your brother, Bridget. You think he can build me up? I know I'm a bit run down. Noexercise, you know. Still, I believe I would have thrashed him to afrazzle if I hadn't stumbled. That was when he kicked me here. I gotthis falling against the table. "

"Yis, sor, " said Bridget, dutifully. 

In response to the pounding on the door, he called out, bravely:--

"You can't come in now, Phoebe. Papa has hurt himself a little bit. I'll come out soon. "

"I got my Sunday dress on, daddy, " cried the childish voice. "And I'mall spruced up. Has the nice gentleman gone away?"

His head sank into his hands. 

"Yes, dearie, he's gone, " he replied, in muffled tones. 

CHAPTER IV

LUNCHEON

For several days, he moped about the house, not even venturing uponthe porch, his face a sight to behold. His spirits were lower thanthey had been in all his life. The unmerciful beating he had sustainedat the hands of Fairfax was not the sole cause of his depression. Asthe consequences of that pummelling subsided, the conditions which ledup to it forced themselves upon him with such horrifying immensitythat he fairly staggered under them. 

It slowly dawned on him that there was something very sinister inFairfax's visit, something terrible. Nellie's protracted stay in town, her strange neglect of Phoebe, to say nothing of himself, the presenceof Fairfax in her dressing-room that night, and a great manycircumstances which came plainly to mind, now that he considered themworth while noticing, all went a long way toward justifying Fairfax incoming to him with the base proposition that had resulted so seriouslyto his countenance. 

Nellie was tired of him! He did not belong to her world. That was thesum and substance of it. As he dropped out of her world, some one elsequite naturally rose to fill the void. That person was Fairfax. Thebig man had said that she wanted a separation, she wanted to provide asafe haven for Phoebe. The inference was plain. She wanted to get ridof him in order to marry Fairfax. Fairfax had been honest enough toconfess that he was acting on his own initiative in proposing thebribe, but there must have been something behind it all. 

He had spoken of "charges. " What charge could Nellie bring againsthim? He was two days in arriving at the only one--failure to provide. Yes, that was it. "Failure to provide. " How he hated the words. How hedespised men who did not provide for their wives. He had never thoughtof himself in that light before. But it was true, all true. And Nelliewas slipping away from him as the result. Not only Nellie but Phoebe. She would be taken from him. 

"I don't drink, " he argued with himself, "and I've never treated hercruelly. Other women don't interest me. I never swear at her. I'venever beaten her. I've always loved her. So it must be that I'm 'nogood, ' just as that scoundrel says. 'No good!' Why, she knows betterthan that. There never was a fellow who worked harder than I did forMr. Davis. I drew trade to his store. Anybody in Blakeville will swearto that. Haven't I tried my best to get a job in the same shows withher? Wasn't I the best comedian they had in the dramatic club? I'venever had the chance to show what I could do, and Nellie knows it. ButI'll show them all! I'll make that big brute wish he'd never beenborn. I'll--I'll assert myself. He shan't take her away from me. "

His resolutions soared to great heights, only to succumb to chillyblasts that sent them shrivelled back to the lowest depths. What couldhe do against a man who had all the money that Fairfax possessed? Whatcould he offer for Nellie, now that some one else had put a stupendousprice on her? He remembered reading about an oil painting thatoriginally sold for five hundred francs and afterward brought fortythousand dollars. Somehow he likened Nellie to a picture, with thereservation that he didn't believe any painting on earth was worthforty thousand dollars. If there was such a thing, he had never seenit. 

Then he began to think of poor Nellie cast helpless among thetempters. She was like a child among voracious beasts of prey. Nowonder she felt hard toward him! He was to blame, terribly to blame. In the highest, most exalted state of remorse he wept, not once butoften. His poor little Nellie!

In one of these strange ever-growing flights of combined self-reproachand self-exaltation he so vividly imagined himself as a rescuer, as anable-bodied defender against all the ills and evils that beset her, that the fancy took the shape of positive determination. He made uphis mind to take her off the stage, back to Blakeville, and to anenvironment so sweet and pure that her life would be one long seasonof joy and happiness. 

With the growth of this resolution he began to plan his own personalrehabilitation. First of all, he would let his face recover itsnatural shape; then he would cultivate muscle and brawn at theemporium of Professor Flaherty; moreover, he would devote considerableattention to his own personal appearance and to the habits of the"men about town. " He would fight the tempters with their ownweapons--the corkscrew, the lobster pick, the knife and fork, and thenut-splitter!

He did not emerge from the house for five days. By that time he wasfairly presentable. 

It was Annie's day out, so he took Phoebe for a little walk. As forPhoebe, she never passed a certain door upstairs without kicking at itwith first one, then the other of her tiny feet, in revenge for theway it had hurt her father by remaining open so that he could bumpinto it on that bloody, terrifying day. She sent little darts ofexquisite pain through him by constantly alluding to the realdevastator as "that nice Mr. Fairy-fax. " It was her pleasure to regardhim as a great big fairy who had promised her in secret that she wouldsome day be like Cinderella and have all the riches the slippershowered upon that poor little lady. 

As they were returning home after a stroll through a rather remotestreet, they came upon Mr. Butler, who was down on his knees fixingsomething or other about his automobile. Harvey thought it a goodopportunity to start his crusade against New York City. 

"Hello, " he said, halting. Butler looked up. He was mad as a wet hento begin with. 

"Hello, " he snarled, resuming his work. 

"I've been thinking about that little----"

"Get out of the light, will you?"

Harvey moved over, dragging Phoebe after him. 

"That little scheme of ours to dine together in town some night. Youremember we talked about it----"

"No, I don't, " snapped Butler. 

"We might lunch together early next week. I know a nice little placeon Seventh Avenue where you get fine spaghetti. We----"

"I'm booked for a whole month of luncheons, " said Butler, sitting backon his heels to stare at this impossible person. "Can't join you. "

"Some other time, then, " said Harvey, waving his hand genially. "Yourwife home yet?"

Butler got upon his feet. 

"Say, " said he, aggressively, "do you know she's heard about thatidiotic trip of mine to town that night? Fairfax told everybody, andsomebody's wife told Mrs. Butler. It got me in a devil of a mess. "

"You don't say so!"

"Yes, I do say so. Next time you catch me--But, what's the use?" Heturned to his work with an expressive shrug of his shoulders. 

"I'll have my wife explain everything to Mrs. Butler the first timeshe comes out, " said Harvey, more bravely than he felt. He could nothelp wondering when Nellie would come out. 

"It isn't necessary, " Butler made haste to assure him. 

Harvey was silent for a moment. 

"Fixing your automobile?" he asked, unwilling to give it up withoutanother effort. 

"What do you suppose I'm doing?"

"It's wonderful how fast one of these little one-seated cars can go, "mused Harvey. "Cheap, too; ain't they?"

Butler faced him again, malice in his glance. 

"It's not in it with that big green car your wife uses, " he said, distinctly. 

"Big green----" began Harvey, blankly. Then he understood. Heswallowed hard, straightened Phoebe's hat with infinite care andgentleness, and looking over Butler's head, managed to say, quitecalmly:--"It used to be blue. We've had it painted. Come along, Phoebe, Mr. Butler's busy. We mustn't bother him. So long, Butler. "

"So long, " said Mr. Butler, suddenly intent upon finding something inthe tool-box. 

The pair moved on. Out of the corner of his eye Butler watched themturn the corner below. 

"Poor little guy!" he said to the monkey wrench. 

The big green car! All the way home that juggernaut green car ranthrough, over, and around him. He could see nothing else, think ofnothing else. A big green car!

That evening he got from Bridget the address of her brother, ProfessorFlaherty, the physical trainer and body builder. 

In the morning he examined himself in the mirror, a fever ofrestlessness and impatience afflicting him with the desire to be oncemore presentable to the world. He had been encouraged by the fact thatButler had offered no comment on the black rims around his eyes. Theymust be disappearing. 

With his chin in his hands he sat across the room staring at hisreflection in the glass, a gloomy, desolate figure. 

"It wouldn't be wise to apply for a job until these eyes are all rightagain, " he was saying to himself, bitterly. "Nobody would hire a manwith a pair of black eyes and a busted lip--especially a druggist. I'll simply have to wait a few days longer. Heigh-ho! To-morrow'sSunday again. I--I wonder if Nellie will be out to see us. "

But Nellie did not come out. She journeyed far and fast in a big greencar, but it was in another direction. 

Thursday of the next week witnessed the sallying forth of HarveyWhat's-His-Name, moved to energy by a long dormant and mournfullyacquired ambition. The delay had been irksome. 

Nellie's check for the month's expenses had arrived in the mail thatmorning. He folded it carefully and put it away in his pocketbook, firmly resolved not to present it at the bank. He intended to returnit to her with the announcement that he had secured a position andhereafter would do the providing. 

Spick and span in his best checked suit, his hat tilted airily overone ear, he stepped briskly down the street. You wouldn't have knownhim, I am sure, with his walking-stick in one hand, his light springovercoat over the other arm. A freshly cleaned pair of grey gloves, smelling of gasoline, covered his hands. On the lapel of his coatloomed a splendid yellow chrysanthemum. Regular football weather, hehad said. 

The first drug store he came to he entered with an air of confidence. No, the proprietor said, he didn't need an assistant. He went on tothe next. The same polite answer, with the additional information, inresponse to a suggestion by the applicant, that the soda-water seasonwas over. Undaunted, he stopped in at the restaurant in the blockbelow. The proprietor of the place looked so sullen and forbiddingthat Harvey lost his courage and instead of asking outright for aposition as manager he asked for a cup of coffee and a couple of friedeggs. As the result of this extra and quite superfluous breakfast heapplied for the job. 

The man looked him over scornfully. 

"I'm the manager and the whole works combined, " he said. "I need adish-washer, come to think of it. Four a week and board. You can go towork to-day if----"

But Harvey stalked out, swinging his cane manfully. 

"Well, God knows I've tried hard enough, " he said to himself, resignedly, as he headed for the railway station. It was still sixminutes of train time. "I'll write to Mr. Davis out in Blakeville thisevening. He told me that my place would always be open to me. "

It was nearly one o'clock when he appeared at Nellie's apartment. Rachel admitted him. He hung his hat and coat on the rack, depositedhis cane in the corner, and sauntered coolly into the littlesitting-room, the maid looking on in no little wonder and uneasiness. 

"Where's my wife?" he asked, taking up the morning paper from thecentre table and preparing to make himself at home in the bigarmchair. 

"She's out to lunch, sir. "

He laid the paper down. 

"Where?"

Rachel mentioned a prominent downtown café affected by theprofession. 

"Will you have lunch here, sir?" she inquired. 

"No, " said he, determinedly. "Thank you just the same. I'm lunchingdowntown. I--I thought perhaps she'd like to join me. "

Rachel rang for the elevator and he departed, amiably doffing his hatto her as he dropped to the floor below. 

At one of the popular corner tables in the big café a party of men andwomen were seated, seven or eight in all. Nellie Duluth had her backtoward the other tables in the room. It was a bit of modesty that shealways affected. She did not like being stared at. Besides, she couldhold her audience to the very end, so to speak, for all in the placeknew she was there and were willing to wait until she condescended toface them in the process of departure. 

It was a very gay party, comprising a grand-opera soprano and a tenorof world-wide reputation, as well as three or four very well-known NewYorkers. Manifestly, it was Fairfax's luncheon. The crowd at thistable was observed by all the neck-craners in the place. Every one wastelling every one else what every one knew:--"That's Nellie Duluthover there. "

As the place began to clear out and tables were being abandoned hereand there, a small man in a checked suit appeared in the doorway. Anattendant took his hat and coat away from him while he was gazing withkaleidoscopic instability of vision upon the gay scene before him. Hehad left his walking-stick in a street car, a circumstance whichdelayed him a long time, for, on missing it, he waited at a corner inthe hope of recognising the motorman on his return trip up MadisonAvenue. 

The head-waiter was bowing before him and murmuring, "How many, sir?"

"How many what?" mumbled Harvey, with a start. 

"In your party?" asked the man, not half so politely and with a degreeof distance in his attitude. It did not look profitable. 

"Oh! Only one, sir. Just a sandwich and a cup of coffee, I think. "

There was a little table away over in the corner sandwiched betweenthe doors of entrance and egress for laden waiters and 'bus boys. Toward this a hastily summoned second or third assistant conductedthe newcomer. Twice during the process of traversing this illimitablespace Harvey bumped against chairs occupied by merry persons whosuddenly became crabbed and asked him who the devil he was stumblingover. 

A blonde, flushed woman who sat opposite Nellie at the table in thecorner caught sight of him as he passed. She stared hard for a momentand then allowed a queer expression to come into her eyes. 

"For Heaven's sake!" she exclaimed, with considerable force. 

"What's the matter? Your husband?" demanded Nellie Duluth, with alaugh. 

"No, " she said, staring harder. "Why, I can't be mistaken. Yes, as Ilive, it's Mr. --Mr. What's-His-Name, your husband, Nellie. "

"Don't turn 'round, Nellie, " whispered Fairfax, who sat beside her. 

"I don't believe it!" cried Nellie, readily. "It isn't possible forHarvey to be here. Where is he?" she demanded in the same breath, looking over her shoulder. 

Harvey was getting out of the way of a 'bus boy and a stack ofchinaware and in the way of a waiter with a tray of peach Melbas whenshe espied him. 

"For the land's sake!" she gasped, going clear back to Blakeville forthe expression. "I don't dare look, Carrie. Tell me, has he got a--afairy with him? Break it gently. "

"Fairy?" sneered Fairfax, suddenly uncomfortable. "Why, he's lost inthe wood. He's alone on a desert isle. What the deuce is he doinghere?"

Harvey gave his order to the disdainful waiter and then settled backin his chair for the first deliberate look around the room in quest ofhis wife. 

Their eyes met. She had turned halfway round in her chair and waslooking at him with wide-open, unbelieving eyes. He felt himselfsuddenly tied hand and foot to the chair. Now that he had found her hecould do no more than stare at her in utter bewilderment. He had cometilting at windmills. 

The flush deepened in her cheek as she turned her attention to thedessert that had just been set down before her. She was very quiet, inmarked contrast to her mood of the moment before. 

Fairfax made a remark which set the others to laughing. She did notsmile, but toyed nervously with the dessert fork. Under cover of thelaughter he leaned over and whispered, an anxious, troubled note inhis voice:--

"I'll call the head waiter and have him put out before he doesanything crazy. "

"Put out?" she repeated. "Why, what do you think he'd try to do?"

"He's got an ugly look in his eye. I tell you, he'll create a scene. That's what he's here for. You remember what happened----"

She laughed shrilly. "He won't shoot any one, " she said in his ear. "Harvey create a scene! Oh, that's rich!"

"He hasn't forgotten the thrashing I gave him. He has been broodingover it, Nellie. " Fairfax was livid about the eyes. 

"Well, I respect him for trying to thrash you, even though he got theworst of it. " She looked again in Harvey's direction. He was stillstaring steadily at her. "He's all alone over there and he'smiserable. I can't stand it. I'm going over to sit with him. "

As she arose Fairfax reached out and grasped her arm. 

"Don't be a fool, " he said, in dismay. 

"I won't, " she replied, sweetly. "Trust me. So long, people. I'm goingover to have coffee with my husband. "

If the occupants of the big café were surprised to see Nellie Duluthmake her way over to the table and sit down with the queer littleperson in checks, not so Harvey. He arose to greet her and would havekissed her if she had not restrained him. He was gratified, overjoyed, but not surprised. 

"Hello!" she said, sharply, to cover the inward disquiet thatpossessed her. She was looking intently into his eyes as if searchingfor something she dreaded. 

"Hello!" was his response. He was still a trifle dazed. 

She sat down opposite him. Before she could think of anything furtherto say the head waiter rushed up to inquire if Miss Duluth and herfriend wouldn't prefer a table at one of the windows. 

"No, this will do, " she said, thankful for the interruption. 

"We are doing very nicely, " said Harvey, rather pompously, adding in aloud voice of authority:--"Tell that fellow to hustle my luncheonalong, will you?" Then, turning to Nellie, he said:--"You don't lookas though you'd ever been sick a day in your life, Nellie. "

She laughed uncomfortably. "How are you, Harvey? And Phoebe?"

"Fine. Never better. Why don't you come out and see us occasionally?"

"May I order a cup of black coffee?" she asked, ignoring the question. She was sorely puzzled. 

"Have a big one, " he urged, signalling a waiter. 

Her curiosity conquered. "What in Heaven's name brought you here, Harvey?"

He told her of the word Rachel had given him. Nellie made a mentalnote of the intention to speak plainly to Rachel. 

"Who are your friends?" he asked. Just then he caught a glimpse ofFairfax's face. He turned very cold. 

"Mr. Fairfax is giving a luncheon for two of the grand-opera people, "she explained. 

He forced his courage. "I don't want you to have anything more to dowith that man, " he said. "He's a scoundrel. "

"Now, don't be silly, " she cried. "What train are you going out on?"

"I don't know. Maybe I'll stay in. I'll go up to your flat, I guess, for a couple of days. Phoebe's all right. She's over the diphtherianow----"

"Diphtheria?" gasped Nellie, wide-eyed, overlooking his otherdeclaration, which, by the way, was of small moment. 

"Almost died, poor kiddie. "

She flared up in an instant. "Why wasn't I told? What were youthinking of, you little fool?"

"If you had taken the trouble to come out to Tarrytown, you could havefound out for yourself, " he retorted, coolly. "Now, see here, Nellie, I've come in to see you and to have a very plain talk with you. Sojust hold your horses. Don't fly off the handle. I am the head of thisfamily and I'm going to boss it from this time on. "

"You----" she began, in a furious little shriek, her eyes blazing. Shecaught herself up in time. Two or three people nearby looked up at thesound of her raised voice. She lowered it to a shrill, intensehalf-whisper. "What do you mean by coming here in this way? Everybodyis laughing at me. You make me ridiculous. I won't stand for it; doyou hear?"

He was colder if possible than before, but he was resolute. 

"We've got to have an understanding, the sooner the better, " he said, quietly. 

"Yes, you're right, " she repeated; "the sooner the better. "

"We can't talk here, " he said, suddenly conscious that the eyes ofmany were upon them. "Go over and ask that infernal sneak to excuseyou, and we'll go up to the flat. "

"I'm going motoring this aft----"

"You do as I tell you!" said he, in a strange voice. 

"Why, Harvey----" she stammered, catching her breath. 

"When you've had your coffee, " he added. 

She sipped her coffee in silence, in wonder, in bitter resentment. Hemunched the club sandwich and sucked the coffee through his thinmoustache with a vehemence that grated on her nerves terribly. 

"I've had all I want, " she said, suddenly putting the little cup downwith a crash. 

"Then go over and tell 'em you've got to go home. "

She crossed the room, red-faced and angry. He watched her as she madean announcement to the party, saw them laugh uproariously, and smiledin triumph over the evidence of annoyance on the part of Fairfax. Nellie was whispering something close to the big man's ear, and he wasshaking his head vigorously. Then she waved her hand to the party andstarted away. Fairfax arose to follow her. As he did so, Harvey cameto his feet and advanced. The big man stopped short, with a look ofactual alarm in his eyes, and went back to his seat, hastily motioningto the head waiter. 

Five minutes later Miss Duluth emerged from the café, followed by thelittle man in the checked suit. 

An attendant blew his whistle and called out down the line of waitingmotors:--

"Mr. Fairfax's car up!"

"Get me a taxi, " ordered Nellie, hastily. 

The man betrayed his surprise. She was obliged to repeat the order. 

"What does a taxi to--to our place cost?" demanded Harvey, feeling inhis pocket. 

"Never mind, " she snapped. "I'll pay for it. "

"No, you won't, " he asserted. "I raised seventeen dollars yesterday onthe watch mother gave me. It's my own money, Nellie, remember that. "

Rachel was plainly amazed when the couple walked into the apartment. The two at once resumed the conversation they had carried on sovigorously in the taxicab on the way up from downtown. Nellie did notremove her hat, sharply commanding Rachel to leave the room. 

"No, " she said, "she simply has to go to the convent. She'll be safethere, no matter how things turn out for you and me, Harve, I insiston that. "

"Things are going to turn out all right for us, Nellie, " he protested, a plaintive note in his voice. It was easily to be seen which had beenthe dominating force in the ride home. 

"Now, you've got to be reasonable, Harve, " she said, firmly. "We can'tgo on as we have been going. Something's just got to happen. "

"Well, doggone it, haven't I said that I'll agree to your trip toEurope? I won't put a stop to that. I see your point clearly. Themanagers think it wise for you to do a bit of studying abroad. I cansee that. I'm not going to be mean. Three months' hard work over therewill get you into grand-opera sure. But that has nothing to do withPhoebe. She can go to Blakeville with me, and then when you come backnext fall I'll have a job here in New York and we'll----"

"Don't talk foolishness, " she blurted out. "You've said that three orfour times. First you wanted me to go back to Blakeville to live. Youinsisted on it. What do you think I am? Why, I wouldn't go back toBlakeville if Heaven was suddenly discovered to be located thereinstead of up in the sky. That's settled. No Blakeville for me. OrPhoebe either. Do you suppose I'm going to have that child grow uplike--like"--she changed the word and continued--"like a yap?"

"All I ask is that you will give me a chance to show what I can do, "he said, earnestly. 

"You can do that just as well with Phoebe in the convent, as I've saidbefore. "

"She's as much my child as she is yours, " he proclaimed, stoutly. 

"Then you ought to be willing to do the sensible thing by her. "

"Why, good Lord, Nell, she's only five, " he groaned. "She'll die ofhomesickness. "

"Nonsense! She'll forget both of us in a month and be happy. "

"She won't forget me!" he exclaimed. 

"Well, I've said my say, " she announced, pacing the floor. "Suppose weagree to disagree. Well, isn't it better to have her out of themess?"

"I won't give her up, derned if I do!"

"Say, don't you know if it comes to a question of law, the Court willgive her to me?"

"I'm not trying to take her away from you. "

"You're trying to ruin my career. "

"Fairfax has put all this into your head, Nellie, dear. He's alow-down rascal. "

"He's my friend, and a good one, too. I don't believe he offered youthat money to agree to a separation. "

"Darn it all, you can still see the scar on my lip. That ought toprove something. If I hadn't stumbled, I'd have knocked him silly. Asit was, he kicked me in the face when I was down. "

"He told me you assaulted him without cause. "

"He lied. "

"Well, that's neither here nor there. I'm sorry you were beaten up sobadly. It wasn't right, I'll admit. He said you were plucky, Harve. Icouldn't believe him at first. "

His face brightened. 

"You give me a chance and I'll show you how plucky I am!" he cried. "Come on now, Nellie, let's make a fresh start. "

She was silent for a long time. At heart she was fair and honest. Shehad lost her love and respect for the little man, but, after all, wasthat altogether his fault? She was sorry for him. 

"Well, I'll think it over, " she said, at last. 

"I'll write to Mr. Davis to-night!" he cried, encouraged. 

"All right. I hope he'll give you a job, " said she, also brightening, but for an entirely different reason. 

"You'll give up this awful thing of--of separating; won't you?"

"I'll promise one thing, Harvey, " said she, suddenly sincere. "I won'tdo anything until I come back from the road. That's fair, isn't it?And I'll tell you what else I'll do. I will let Phoebe stay with youin Tarrytown until the end of the tour--in May. "

"But I'm going to Blakeville, " he protested. 

"No, " said she, firmly, "I won't agree to that. Either you stay inTarrytown or she goes to the convent. "

"I can't get work in Tarrytown. "

"You can tell Mr. Davis you will come out to Blakeville in time forthe opening of the soda-water season. I'll do the work for the familytill then. That's all I'll consent to. I'll ask for a legal separationif you don't agree to that. "

"I--I'll think it over, " he said, feebly; "I'll stay here with you fora couple of days, and----"

"You will do nothing of the sort!" she cried. "Do you suppose I'mgoing to spoil my chances for a separation, if I want to apply, byletting you live in the same house with me? Why, that would be wastingthe two months already gone. "

He did not comprehend, and he was afraid to ask for an explanation. The term "failure to provide" was the only one he could get throughhis head; "desertion" was out of the question. His brow was wet withthe sweat of a losing conflict. He saw that he would have to accepther ultimatum and trust to luck to provide a way out of thedifficulty. Time would justify him, he was confident. In the meantime, he would ease his conscience by returning the check, knowing full wellthat it would not be accepted. He would then take it, of course, withreservations. Every dollar was to be paid back when he obtained asatisfactory position. 

He determined, however, to extract a promise from her before givingin. 

"I will consent, Nellie, on the condition that you stop seeing thisfellow Fairfax and riding around in his big green car. I won't standfor that. "

Nellie smiled, more to herself than to him. She had Fairfax in themeshes. He was safe. The man was madly in love with her. The instantshe was freed from Harvey he stood ready to become herhusband--Fairfax, with all his money and all his power. 

And that is precisely what she was aiming at. She could afford tosmile, but somehow she was coming to feel that this little man whowas now her husband had it in him, after all, to put up a fierce anddesperate fight for his own. If he were pushed to the wall he wouldfight back like a wildcat, and well she knew that there would bedisagreeable features in the fray. 

"If you are going to talk like that I'll never speak to you again, "she said, banishing the smile. "Don't you trust me?"

"Sure, " he said, and he meant it. "That's not the point. "

"See here, Harve, " she said, abruptly putting her hands on hisshoulders and looking squarely into his eyes, "I want you to believeme when I say that I am a--a--well, a good woman. "

"I believe it, " he said, solemnly. Then, as an after-thought, "and Iwant to say the same thing for myself. "

"I've never doubted you, " said she, fervently. "Now, go home and letthings stand as they are. Write to Mr. Davis to-night. "

"I will. I say, won't you give me a kiss?"

She hesitated, still calculating. 

"Yes, if you promise not to tell anybody, " she said, with mocksolemnity. As she expected, he took it seriously. 

"Do you suppose I go 'round telling people I've kissed my wife?"

Then she gave him a peck on the cheek and let it go as a kiss. 

"When will you be out to see us?"

"Soon, I hope, " she said, quickly. "Now go, Harve, I'm going to liedown and rest. Kiss Phoebe for me. "

He got to the door. She was fairly pushing him. 

"I feel better, " he said, taking a long breath. 

"So do I, " said she. 

He paused for a moment to frown in some perplexity. 

"Say, Nell, I left my cane in a street car coming down. Do you thinkit would be worth while to advertise for it?"

CHAPTER V

CHRISTMAS

The weeks went slowly by and Christmas came to the little house inTarrytown. He had become resigned but not reconciled to Nellie'scontinued and rather persistent absence, regarding it as the sinisterproclamation of her intention to carry out the plan for separation inspite of all that he could do to avert the catastrophe. His devotionto Phoebe was more intense than ever; it had reached the stage ofbeing pathetic. 

True to his word, he wrote to Mr. Davis, who in time responded, sayingthat he could give him a place at the soda fountain in May, but thatthe wages would of necessity be quite small, owing to the fact thatthe Greeks had invaded Blakeville with the corner fruit stands andsoft-drink fountains. He could promise him eight dollars a week, orten dollars if he would undertake to come to the store at six A. M. Andsweep up, a task now performed by the proprietor himself, who foundhimself approaching an age and a state of health that craved a feastof luxury and ease hitherto untasted. 

Harvey was in considerable doubt as to his ability to live on tendollars a week and support Phoebe, as well as to begin the task ofreimbursing Nellie for her years of sacrifice. Still, it was betterthan nothing at all, so he accepted Mr. Davis' ten-dollar-a-week offerand sat back to wait for the coming of the first of May. 

In the meantime he would give Nellie some return for her money bydoing the work now performed by Annie--or, more advisedly speaking, aportion of it. He would conduct Phoebe to the kindergarten and callfor her at the close of sessions, besides dressing her in the morning, sewing on buttons for her, undressing her at night, and all such jobsas that, with the result that Annie came down a dollar a week in herwages and took an extra afternoon out. In this way he figured he couldsave Nellie at least thirty dollars. He also did the janitor's workabout the place and looked after the furnace, creating a salvage ofthree dollars and a half a month. Moreover, instead of buying a newwinter suit and replacing his shabby ulster with one more comely andpresentable, he decided to wear his fall suit until January and thenchange off to his old blue serge spring suit, which still seemed farfrom shiny, so far as he could see. 

And so it was that Nellie's monthly check for $150 did very nicely. 

Any morning at half-past eight, except Sunday, you could have seen himgoing down the street with Phoebe at his side, her hand in his, boundfor the kindergarten. He carried her little lunch basket and whistledmerrily when not engaged in telling her about Santa Claus. Shestartled him one day by asking:--

"Are you going to be Santy this year, daddy, or is mamma?"

He looked down at the rich little fur coat and muff Nellie hadoutfitted her with, at the expensive hat and the silk muffler, andsighed. 

"If you ask questions, Santy won't come at all, " he said, darkly. "He's a mighty cranky old chap, Santy is. "

He did not take up physical culture with Professor Flaherty, partly onaccount of the expense, partly because he found that belabouringcannel coal and shaking down the furnace was more developing than hehad expected. Raking the autumn leaves out of the front yard also washarder than he had any idea it would be. He was rather glad it was notthe season for the lawn mower. 

Down in his heart he hoped that Nellie would come out for Christmas, but he knew there was no chance of it. She would have two performanceson that day. He refrained from telling Phoebe until the very lastminute that her mother would not be out for the holiday. He hadn't theheart to do it. 

He broke the news then by telling the child that her mother wassnowbound and couldn't get there. An opportune fall of snow the daybefore Christmas gave him the inspiration. 

He set up the little Christmas tree in the back parlour, assisted byBridget and Annie, after Phoebe had gone to bed on Christmas Eve. Shehad urged him to read to her about Tiny Tim, but he put her off withthe announcement that Santa was likely to be around early on accountof the fine sleighing, and if he saw that she wasn't asleep in bed hemight skip the house entirely. 

The expressman, in delivering several boxes from town that afternoon, had said to his helper:--

"That little fellow that came to the door was Nellie Duluth's husband, Mr. --Mr. ----Say, look on the last page there and see what his name is. He's a cheap skate. A dime! Wot do you think of that?" He held up thedime Harvey had given him and squinted at it as if it were almost toosmall to be seen with the naked eye. 

Nellie sent "loads" of presents to Phoebe--toys, books, candies, fruits, pretty dresses, a velvet coat, a tiny pair of opera glasses, strings of beads, bracelets, rings--dozens of things calculated to seta child mad with delight. There were pocketbooks, handkerchiefs, squirrel stoles and muffs for each of the servants, a box of cigarsfor the postman, another for the milkman, and a five-dollar bill forthe janitor. 

There was nothing for Harvey. 

He looked for a long time at the envelope containing the five-dollarbill, an odd little smile creeping into his eyes. He was the janitor, he remembered. After a moment of indecision he slipped the bill intoanother envelope, which he marked "Charity" and laid aside untilmorning brought the mendicant who, with bare fingers and frosted lips, always came to play his mournful clarionet in front of the house. 

Surreptitiously he searched the two big boxes carefully, inwardlyhoping that she had not forgotten--nay, ignored--him. But there wasnothing there, not even a Christmas card! It was the first Christmasshe had. . . . 

The postman brought a small box addressed to Phoebe. The handwritingwas strange, but he thought nothing of it. He thought it was nice ofButler to remember his little one and lamented the fact that he hadnot bought something for the little Butlers, of whom there were seven. He tied a red ribbon around the sealed package and hung it on thetree. 

After it was all over he went upstairs and tried to read "Dombey &Son. " But a mist came over his blue eyes and his vision carried himfar beyond the printed page. He was not thinking of Nellie, but of hisold mother, who had never forgotten to send him a Christmas present. Ah, if she were alive he would not be wondering to-night why SantaClaus had passed him by. 

He rubbed his eyes with his knuckles, closed "Dombey & Son" for thenight, and went to bed, turning his thoughts to the row of tinystockings that hung from the mantelpiece downstairs--for Phoebe hadput to use all that she could find--and then let them drift on throughspace to an apartment near Central Park, where Kris Kringle haddelivered during the day a little packet containing the brooch he hadpurchased for his wife out of the money he had preserved from the saleof his watch some weeks before. 

He was glad he had sent Nellie a present. 

Bright and early the next morning he was up to have a final look atthe tree before Phoebe came down. A blizzard was blowing furiously;the windows were frosted; the house was cheerless. He built the firesin the grates and sat about with his shoulders hunched up till themerry crackle of the coals put warmth into his veins. The furnace! Hethought of it in time, and hurried to the basement to replenish thefires. They were out. He had forgotten them the night before. Bridgetfound him there later on, trying to start the kindling in the twofurnaces. 

"I clean forgot 'em last night, " he said, sheepishly. 

"I don't wonder, sor, " said Bridget, quite genially for a coldmorning. "Do you be after going upstairs this minute, sor. I'll havethem roaring in two shakes av a lamb's tail. Mebby there's good newsfor yez up there. Annie's at the front door this minute, taking atelegram from the messenger bye, sor. Merry Christmas to ye, sor. "

"Merry Christmas, Bridget!" cried he, gaily. His heart had leaped atthe news she brought. A telegram from Nellie! Hurrah! He rushedupstairs without brushing the coal dust from his hands. 

The boy was waiting for his tip. Harvey gave him a quarter and wishedhim a merry Christmas. 

"A miserable day to be out, " said he, undecided whether to ask thehalf-frozen lad to stay and have a bite of breakfast or to let him goout into the weather. 

"It's nothin' when you gets used to it, " said the blue-cappedphilosopher, and took his departure. 

"But it's the getting used to it, " said Harvey to Annie as she handedhim the message. He tore open the envelope. She saw the light die outof his eyes. 

The message was from Ripton, the manager, and read:--

 "Please send Phoebe in with the nurse to see the matinée to-day. "The invitation was explicit enough. He was not wanted. 

If he had a secret inclination to ignore the command altogether, itwas frustrated by his own short-sightedness. He gulped, and then readthe despatch aloud for the benefit of the maid. When it was too latehe wished he had not done so. 

Annie beamed. "Oh, sir, I've always wanted to see Miss Duluth act. Iwill take good care of Phoebe. "

He considered it beneath his dignity to invite her into a conspiracyagainst the child, so he gloomily announced that he would go in withthem on the one-o'clock train and stay to bring them out. 

The Christmas tree was a great success. Phoebe was in raptures. Hequite forgot his own disappointment in watching her joyous antics. Asthe distributor of the presents that hung on the gaily trimmed anddazzling cedar, he came at last to the little package from Butler. Itcontained a beautiful gold chain, at the end of which hung suspended asmall diamond-studded slipper--blue enamel, fairly covered with rosediamonds. 

Phoebe screamed with delight. Her father's face was a study. 

"Why, they are diamonds!" he murmured. "Surely Butler wouldn't begiving presents like this. " A card fluttered to the floor. He pickedit up and read:--"A slipper for my little Cinderella. Keep it and itwill bring good luck. "

There was no name, but he knew who had sent it. With a cry of rage hesnatched the dainty trinket from her hand and threw it on the floor, raising his foot to stamp it out of shape with his heel. His firstvicious attempt missed the slipper altogether, and before he couldrepeat it the child was on the floor clutching it in her fingers, whimpering strangely. The servants looked on in astonishment. 

He drew back, mumbling something under his breath. In a moment heregained control of himself. 

"It--it isn't meant for you, darling, " he said, hoarsely. "Santy leftit here by mistake. We will send it back to him. It belongs to someother poor little girl. "

"But I am Cinderella!" she cried. "Mr. Fairy-fax said so. He toldSanty to bring it to me. Please, daddy--please!"

He removed it gently from her fingers and dropped it into his pocket. His face was very white. 

"Santy isn't that kind of a man, " he said, without rhyme or reason. "Now, don't cry, dearie. Here's another present from mamma. See!"

Later in the morning, after she had quite forgotten the slipper, heput it back in the box, wrapped it carefully, and addressed thepackage to L. Z. Fairfax, in New York City, without explanation orcomment. 

[Illustration: Copyright, 1911, by Dodd, Mead & CompanyPhoebe]

Before the morning was half over he was playing with Phoebe and hertoys quite as childishly and gleefully as she, his heart in the funshe was having, his mind almost wholly cleared of the bitterness andrancour that so recently had filled it to overflowing. 

The three of them floundered through the snowdrifts to the station, laughing and shouting with a merriment that proved infectious. Thelong-obscured sun came out and caught the disease, for he smiledbroadly, and the wind gave over snarling and smirked with anamiability that must have surprised the shivering horses standingdesolate in front of certain places wherein their owners partook ofChristmas cheer that was warm. 

Harvey took Phoebe and the nurse to the theatre in a cab. He went upto the box-office window and asked for the two tickets. The seller wasmost agreeable. He handed out the little envelope with the words:--

"A packed house to-day, Mr. --Mr. --er--ah, and--sold out for to-night. Here you are, with Miss Duluth's compliments--the best seats in thehouse. And here is a note for--er--yes, for the nurse. "

Annie read the note. It was from Nellie, instructing her to bringPhoebe to her dressing-room after the performance, where they wouldhave supper later on. 

Harvey saw them pass in to the warm theatre and then slowly wanderedout to the bleak, wind-swept street. There was nothing for him to do;nowhere that he could go to seek cheerful companions. For an hour ormore he wandered up and down Broadway, his shoulders hunched up, hismittened hands to his ears, water running from his nose and eyes, hisface the colour of the setting sun. Half-frozen, he at last venturedinto a certain café, a place where he had lunched no fewer thanhalf-a-dozen times, and where he thought his identity might haveremained with the clerk at the cigar stand. 

There were men at the tables, smoking and chatting hilariously. At oneof them sat three men, two of whom were actors he had met. Summoninghis courage, he approached them with a well-assumed air ofnonchalance. 

"Merry Christmas, " was his greeting. The trio looked at him with nosign of recognition. "How are you. Mr. Brackley? How are you, Joe?"

The two actors shook hands with him without much enthusiasm, certainlywithout interest. 

Light dawned on one of them. "Oh, " said he, cheerlessly, "how are you?I couldn't place you at first. " He did not offer to introduce him tothe stranger, but proceeded to enlighten the other players. "It's--oh, you know--Nellie Duluth's husband. "

The other fellow nodded and resumed his conversation with the thirdman. At the same time the speaker leaned forward to devote hisattention to the tale in hand, utterly ignoring the little man, whostood with his hand on the back of the vacant chair. 

Harvey waited for a few moments. "What will you have to drink?" heasked, shyly dropping into the chair. They stared at him and shooktheir heads. 

"That seat's engaged, " said the one called "Joe, " gruffly. 

Harvey got up instantly. "Oh, " he said, in a hesitating manner. Theywent on with their conversation as if he were not there. After amoment he moved away, his ears burning, his soul filled withmortification and shame. In a sort of daze he approached the cigarstand and asked for a box of cigarettes. 

"What kind?" demanded the clerk, laying down his newspaper. 

Harvey smiled engagingly. "Oh, the kind I usually get!" he said, feeling sure that the fellow remembered him and the quality hesmoked. 

"What's that?" snapped the clerk, scowling. 

The purchaser hastily mentioned a certain kind of cigarette, paid forit after the box had been tossed at him, and walked away. Fixed in hisdetermination to stay in the place until he was well thawed out, hetook a seat at a little table near the stairway and ordered a hotlemonade. 

He was conscious of a certain amount of attention from the tablesadjacent to the trio he had accosted. Several loud guffaws came to hisears as he sipped the boiling drink. Taking an unusually copiousswallow, he coughed and spluttered as the liquid scalded his tongueand palate. The tears rushed to his eyes. From past experience he knewthat his tongue would be sore for at least a week. He had such atender tongue, Nellie said. 

For half an hour he sat there dreaming and brooding. It was muchbetter than tramping the streets. A clock on the opposite wall pointedto four o'clock. The matinée would be over at a quarter to five. Presently he looked again. It was five minutes past four. Really itwasn't so bad waiting after all; not half so bad as he had thought itwould be. 

Some one tapped him on the shoulder. He looked up with a start. Themanager of the place stood at his elbow. 

"This isn't a railway station, young feller, " he said, harshly. "You'll have to move on. These tables are for customers. "

"But I've bought----"

"Now, don't argue about it. You heard what I said. Move along. "

The man's tone was peremptory. Poor Harvey looked around as if insearch of a single benevolent face, and then, without a word ofprotest, arose and moved quickly toward the door. His eyes were fixedin a glassy stare on the dancing, elusive doorway. He wondered if hecould reach it before he sank through the floor. Somehow he had thehorrible feeling that just as he opened it to go out some one wouldkick him from behind. He could almost feel the impact of the boot andinvoluntarily accelerated his speed as he opened the door to pass intothe biting air of the now darkening street. 

"I hate this damned town, " said he to himself over and over again ashe flung himself against the gale that almost blew him off his feet. When he stopped to take his bearings, he was far above Longacre Squareand still going in the wrong direction. He was befuddled. A policemantold him in hoarse, muffled tones to go back ten blocks or so if hewanted to find the theatre where Nellie Duluth was playing. 

A clock in an apothecary's shop urged him to hurry. When he came tothe theatre, the newsboys were waiting for the audience to appear. Hewas surrounded by a mob of boys and men shouting the extras. 

"Is the show out?" he asked one of them. 

"No, sir!" shouted the boy, eagerly. "Shall I call up your automobile, mister!"

"No, thank you, " said Harvey through his chattering teeth. For amoment he felt distinctly proud and important. So shrewd a judge ofhumanity as a New York "newsy" had taken him to be a man of parts. Forawhile he had been distressed by the fear, almost the conviction, thathe was regarded by all New York as a "jay. "

Belying his suddenly acquired air of importance, he hunched himself upagainst the side of the building, partly sheltered from the wind, andwaited for the crowd to pour forth. With the appearance of the firstof those home-goers he would repair to the stage door, and, oncebehind the scenes, was quite certain that he would receive aninvitation from Nellie to join the gay little family supper party inher dressing-room. 

When the time came, however, he approached the doorman withconsiderable trepidation. He had a presentiment that there would be"no admittance. " Sure enough, the grizzled doorman, poking his headout, gruffly informed him that no one was allowed "back" without anorder from the manager. Harvey explained who he was, taking it forgranted that the man did not know him with his coat-collar turnedup. 

"I know you, all right, " said the man, not unkindly. "I'd like to letyou in, but--you see----" He coughed and looked about ratherhelplessly, avoiding the pleading look in the visitor's eyes. 

"It's all right, " Nellie's husband assured him, but an arm barred theway. 

"I've got strict orders not to admit you, " blurted out the doorman, hating himself. 

"Not to admit me!" said Harvey, slowly. 

"I'm sorry, sir. Orders is orders. "

"But my little girl is there. "

"Yes, sir, I understand. The orders are for you, sir, not for thekid. " Struck by the look in the little man's eyes he hastened to say, "Maybe if you saw Mr. Ripton out front and sent a note in to MissDuluth, she'd change her mind and----"

"Good Lord!" fell from Harvey's lips as he abruptly turned away tolook for a spot where he could hide himself from every one. 

Two hours later, from his position at the mouth of the alley, he saw aman come out of the stage door and blow a whistle thrice. He wasalmost perishing with cold; he was sure that his ears were frozen. Asharp snap at the top of each of them and a subsequent warmth urgedhim to press quantities of snow against them, obeying the old rulethat like cures like. From the kitchens of a big restaurant came theodours of cooking foodstuffs. He was hungry on this Merry Christmasnight, but he would not leave his post. He had promised to wait forPhoebe and take her out home with him in the train. 

With the three blasts of the whistle he stirred his numb feet andedged nearer to the stage door. A big limousine came rumbling up thealley from behind, almost running him down. The fur-coated chauffeurcalled him unspeakable names as he passed him with the emergencybrakes released. 

Before he could reach the entrance, the door flew open and a smallfigure in fur coat and a well known white hat was bundled into themachine by a burly stage hand. A moment later Annie clambered in, thedoor was slammed and the machine started ahead. 

He shouted as he ran, but his cry was not heard. As the car careeneddown the narrow lane, throwing snow in all directions, he dropped intoa dejected, beaten walk. Slowly he made his way in the trail of thebig car--it was too dark for him to detect the colour, but he felt itwas green--and came at last to the mouth of the alley, desolate, bewildered, hurt beyond all understanding. 

For an instant he steadied himself against the icy wall of a building, trying to make up his mind what to do next. Suddenly it occurred tohim that if he ran hard and fast he could catch the train--theseven-thirty--and secure a bit of triumph in spite of circumstances. 

He went racing up the street toward Sixth Avenue, dodging head-loweredpedestrians with the skill of an Indian, and managed to reachForty-second Street without mishap or delay. Above the library he wasstopped by a policeman, into whose arms he went full tilt, almostbowling him over. The impact dazed him. He saw many stars on theofficer's breast. As he looked they dwindled into one bright andshining planet and a savage voice was bellowing:--

"Hold still or I'll bat you over the head!"

"I'm--I'm trying to make the seven-thirty, " he panted, wincing underthe grip on his arm. 

"We'll see about that, " growled the policeman. 

"For Heaven's sake, Mr. Policeman, I haven't done anything. Honest, I'm in a hurry. My little girl's on that train. We live in Tarrytown. She'll cry her eyes out if I----"

"What was you running for?"

"For it, " said Harvey, at the end of a deep breath. 

"It's only seven-five now, " said the officer, suspiciously. 

"Well, it's the seven-ten I want, then, " said Harvey, hastily. 

"I guess I'll hold you here and see if anybody comes chasin' up afteryou. Not a word, now. Close your trap. "

As no one came up to accuse the prisoner of murder, theft, orintoxication, the intelligent policeman released him at the expirationof fifteen minutes. A crowd had collected despite the cold. Harvey wasalways to remember that crowd of curious people; he never ceasedwondering where they came from and why they were content to standthere shivering in the zero weather when there were stoves and steamradiators everywhere to be found. To add to his humiliation at least adozen men and boys, not satisfied with the free show as far as it hadgone, pursued him to the very gates in the concourse. 

"Darned loafers!" said Harvey, hotly, but under his breath, as heshowed his ticket and his teeth at the same time. Then he rushed forthe last coach and swung on as it moved out. 

Now, if I were inclined to be facetious or untruthful I might easilyadd to his troubles by saying that he got the wrong train, orsomething of the sort, but it is not my purpose to be harder on himthan I have to be. 

It was the right train, and, better still, Annie and Phoebe were inthe very last seat of the very last coach. With a vast sigh he droppedinto a vacant seat ahead of them and began fanning himself with hishat, to the utter amazement of onlookers, who had been disturbed byhis turbulent entrance. 

The newspaper Annie was reading fell from her hands. 

"My goodness, sir! Where did you come from?" she managed to inquire. 

"I've been--dining--at--Sherry's, " he wheezed. "Annie, will you lookand see if my ears are frozen?"

"They are, sir. Good gracious!"

He realised that he had been indiscreet. 

"I--I sat in a draught, " he hastened to explain. "Did you have a nicetime, Phoebe?"

The child was sleepy. "No, " she said, almost sullenly. His heart gavea bound. "Mamma wouldn't let me eat anything. She said I'd get fat. "

"You had quite enough to eat, Phoebe, " said Annie. 

"I didn't, " said Phoebe. 

"Never mind, " said her father, "I'll take you to Sherry's some day. "

"When, daddy?" she cried, wide awake at once. "I like to go to placeswith you. "

He faltered. "Some day after mamma has gone off on the road. We'll beterribly gay, while she's away, see if we ain't. "

Annie picked up the paper and handed it to him. 

"Miss Duluth ain't going on the road, sir, " she said. "It's in thepaper. "

He read the amazing news. Annie, suddenly voluble, gave it to him byword of mouth while he read. It was all there, she said, to provewhat she was telling him. "Just as if I couldn't read!" said Harvey, as he began the article all over again after perusing the first fewlines in a perfectly blank state of mind. 

"Yes, sir, the doctor says she can't stand it on the road. She's gotnervous prosperity and she's got to have a long rest. That Miss Brownis going to take her place in the play after this week and Miss Duluthis going away out West to live for awhile to get strong again. She----What is the name of the town, Phoebe?"

"Reno, " said Phoebe, promptly. 

"But the name of the town isn't in the paper, sir, " Annie informedhim. "It's a place where people with complications go to get rid ofthem, Miss Nellie says. The show won't be any good without her, sir. Iwouldn't give two cents to see it. "

He sagged down in the seat, a cold perspiration starting out all overhis body. 

"When does she go--out there!" he asked, as in a dream. 

"First of next week. She goes to Chicago with the company and thenright on out to--to--er--to----"

"Reno, " said he, lifelessly. 

"Yes, sir. "

He did not know how long afterward it was that he heard Phoebe sayingto him, her tired voice barely audible above the clacking of thewheels:--

"I want a drink of water, daddy. "

His voice seemed to come back to him from some far-away place. Heblinked his eyes several times and said, very wanly:--

"You mustn't drink water, dearie. It will make you fat. "

CHAPTER VI

THE REVOLVER

He waited until the middle of the week for some sign from her; nonecoming, he decided to go once more to her apartment before it was toolate. The many letters he wrote to her during the first days afterlearning of her change of plans were never sent. He destroyed them. Asense of shame, a certain element of pride, held them back. Still, heargued with no little degree of justice, there were many things to bedecided before she took the long journey--and the short step she wasso plainly contemplating. 

It was no more than right that he should make one last and determinedeffort to save her from the fate she was so blindly courting. It wasdue her. She was his wife. He had promised to cherish and protect her. If she would not listen to the appeal, at least he would have done hisbounden duty. 

There was an ever present, ugly fear, too, that she meant, by somehook or crook, to rob him of Phoebe. 

"And she's as much mine as hers, " he declared to himself a thousandtimes or more. 

Behind everything, yet in plain view, lay his own estimate ofhimself--the naked truth--he was "no good!" He had come to the pointof believing it of himself. He was not a success; he was quite theother thing. But, granting that, he was young and entitled to anotherchance. He could work into a partnership with Mr. Davis if given thetime. 

Letting the midweek matinée slip by, he made the plunge on a Thursday. She was to leave New York on Sunday morning; that much he knew fromthe daily newspapers, which teemed with Nellie's breakdown and itslamentable consequences. It would be at least a year, the papers said, before she could resume her career on the stage. He searched thecolumns daily for his own name, always expecting to see himself intype little less conspicuous than that accorded to her, andstigmatised as a brute, an inebriate, a loafer. It was all the same tohim--brute, soak, or loafer. But even under these extraordinaryconditions he was as completely blanketed by obscurity as if he neverhad been in existence. 

Sometimes he wondered whether she could get a divorce withoutaccording him a name. He had read of fellow creatures meeting death"at the hand of a person (or of persons) unknown. " Could a divorcecomplaint be worded in such non-committal terms? Then there was thattime-honoured shroud of private identity, the multitudinous John Doe. Could she have the heart to bring proceedings against him as John Doe?He wondered. 

If he were to shoot himself, so that she might have her freedomwithout going to all the trouble of a divorce or the annoyance of aterm of residence in Reno, would she put his name on a tombstone? Hewondered. 

A strange, a most unusual thing happened to him just before he leftthe house to go to the depot. He was never quite able to account forthe impulse which sent him upstairs rather obliquely to search througha trunk for a revolver, purchased a couple of years before, followingthe report that housebreakers were abroad in Tarrytown, and which hehad promptly locked away in his trunk for fear that Phoebe might gethold of it. 

He rummaged about in the trunk, finally unearthing the weapon. Heslipped it into his overcoat pocket with a furtive glance over hisshoulder. He chuckled as he went down the stairs. It was a funny thingfor him to do, locking the revolver in the trunk that way. Whatburglar so obliging as to tarry while he went through all thepreliminaries incident to destruction under the circumstances? Yes, itwas stupid of him. 

He did not consider the prospect of being arrested for carryingconcealed weapons until he was halfway to the city, and then he brokeinto a mild perspiration. From that moment he eyed every man withsuspicion. He had heard of "plain clothes men. " They were the veryworst kind. "They take you unawares so, " said he to himself, withwhich he moved closer to the wall of the car, the more effectually toconceal the weapon. It wouldn't do to be caught going about with arevolver in one's pocket. That would be the very worst thing thatcould happen. It would mean "the Island" or some other such place, forhe could not have paid a fine. 

It occurred to him, therefore, that it would be wiser to get down atOne Hundred and Tenth street and walk over to Nellie's. The policemenwere not so thick nor so bothersome up there, he figured, and it was arather expensive article he was carrying; one never got them back fromthe police, even if the fine were paid. 

Footsore, weary, and chilled to the bone, he at length came to theapartment building wherein dwelt Nellie Duluth. In these last fewweeks he had developed a habit of thinking of her as Nellie Duluth, aperson quite separate and detached from himself. He had come to regardhimself as so far removed from Nellie Duluth that it was quiteimpossible for him to think of her as Mrs. --Mrs. --he had to rack hisbrain for the name, the connection was so remote. 

He had walked miles--many devious and lengthening miles--beforefinally coming to the end of his journey. Once he came near asking apoliceman to direct him to Eighty-ninth Street, but the suddenrecollection of the thing he carried stopped him in time. That and thediscovery of a sign on a post which frostily informed him that he wasthen in the very street he sought. 

It should go without the saying that he hesitated a long time beforeentering the building. Perhaps it would be better after all to writeto her. Somewhat sensibly he argued that a letter would reach her, while it was more than likely he would fall short of a similarachievement. She couldn't deny Uncle Sam, but she could slam the doorin her husband's face. Yes, he concluded, a letter was the thing. Having come to this half-hearted decision, he proceeded to arguehimself out of it. Suppose that she received the letter, did it followthat she would reply to it? He might enclose a stamp and all that sortof thing, but he knew Nellie; she wouldn't answer a letter--at least, not that kind of letter. She would laugh at it, and perhaps show it toher friends, who also would be vastly amused. He remembered some ofthem as he saw them in the café that day; they were given touproarious laughter. No, he concluded, a letter was not the thing. Hemust see her. He must have it out with her, face to face. 

So he went up in the elevator to the eleventh floor, which was the topone, got out and walked down to the sixth, where she lived. Her namewas on the door plate. He read it three or four times beforeresolutely pressing the electric button. Then he looked over hisshoulder quickly, impelled by the queer feeling that some one wasbehind him, towering like a dark, threatening shadow. A rough handseemed ready to close upon his shoulder to drag him back and down. Butno one was there. He was alone in the little hall. And yet somethingwas there. He could feel it, though he could not see it; somethingsinister that caused him to shiver. His tense fingers relaxed theirgrip on the revolver. Strangely the vague thing that disturbed himdeparted in a flash and he felt himself alone once more. It was veryodd, thought he. 

Rachel came to the door. She started back in surprise, aye, alarm, when she saw the little man in the big ulster. A look of consternationsprang into her black eyes. 

He opened his lips to put the natural question, but paused with thewords unuttered. The sound of voices in revelry came to his ears fromthe interior of the apartment, remote but very insistent. Men's voicesand women's voices raised in merriment. His gaze swept the exposedportion of the hall. Packing boxes stood against the wall, piled high. The odour of camphor came out and smote his sense of smell. 

Rachel was speaking. Her voice was peculiarly hushed and the wordscame quickly, jerkily from her lips. 

"Miss Duluth is engaged, sir. I'm sorry she will not be able to seeyou. "

He stared uncertainly at her and beyond her. 

"So she's packing her things, " he murmured, more to himself than tothe servant. Rachel was silent. He saw the door closing in his face. Acurious sense of power, of authority, came over him. "Hold on, " hesaid sharply, putting his foot against the door. "You go and tell herI want to see her. It's important--very important!"

"She has given orders, sir, not to let you----"

"Well, I'm giving a few orders myself, and I won't stand for any backtalk, do you hear? Who is the master of this place, tell me that?" Hethumped his breast with his knuckles. "Step lively, now. Tell her I'mhere. "

He pushed his way past her and walked into what he called the"parlour, " but what was to Nellie the "living-room. " Here he foundnumerous boxes, crates, and parcels, all prepared for shipment orstorage. Quite coolly he examined the tag on a large crate. The word"Reno" smote him. As he cringed he smiled a sickly smile without beingconscious of the act. "Wait a minute, " he called to Rachel, who wasedging in an affrighted manner toward the lower end of the hall andthe dining-room. "What is she doing?"

Rachel's face brightened. He was going to be amenable to reason. 

"It's a farewell luncheon, sir. She simply can't be disturbed. I'lltell her you were here. "

"You don't need to tell her anything, " said he, briskly. The sight ofthose crates and boxes had made another man of him. "I'll announcemyself. She won't----"

"You'd better not!" cried Rachel, distractedly. "There are some menhere. They will throw you out of the apartment. They're big enough, Mr. --Mr. ----"

He grinned. His fingers took a new grip on the revolver. 

"Napoleon wasn't as big as I am, " he said, much to Rachel's distress. It sounded very mad to her. "Size isn't everything. "

"For Heaven's sake, sir, please don't----"

"They seem to be having a gay old time, " said he, as a particularlywild burst of laughter came from the dining-room. He hesitated. "Whois out there?"

Rachel was cunning. "I don't know the names, sir. They're--they'restrangers to me. "

At that instant the voice of Fairfax came to his ears, loudlyproclaiming a health to the invalid who was going to Reno. Harveystood there in the hall, listening to the toast. He heard it to theend, and the applause that followed. If he were to accept thediagnosis of the speaker, Nellie was repairing to Reno to be cured ofan affliction that had its inception seven years before, a commonmalady, but not fatal if taken in time. The germ, or, more properlyspeaking, the parasite, unlike most bacteria, possessed but two legs, and so on and so forth. 

The laughter was just dying away when Harvey--who recognised himselfas the pestiferous germ alluded to--strode into the room, followed bythe white-faced Rachel. 

"Who was it, Rachel?" called out Nellie, from behind the enormouscentrepiece of roses which obstructed her view of the unwelcomevisitor. 

The little man in the ulster piped up, shrilly:--

"She don't know my name, but I guess you do, if you'll think realhard. "

There were ten at the table, flushed with wine and the exertion ofhilarity. Twenty eyes were focussed on the queer, insignificant littleman in the doorway. If they had not been capable of focussing them onanything a moment before, they acquired the power to do so now. 

Nellie, staring blankly, arose. She wet her lips twice beforespeaking. 

"Who let you in here?" she cried, shrilly. 

One of the men pushed back his chair and came to his feet a bitunsteadily. 

"What the deuce is it, Nellie?" he hiccoughed. 

Nellie had her wits about her. She was very pale, but she was calm. Instinctively she felt that trouble--even tragedy--was confrontingher; the thing she had feared all along without admitting it even toherself. 

"Sit down, Dick, " she commanded. "Don't get excited, any of you. It'sall right. My husband, that's all. "

The man at her right was Fairfax. He was gaping at Harvey with horrorin his face. He, too, had been expecting something like this. Involuntarily he shifted his body so that the woman on the other side, a huge creature, was partially between him and the little man in thedoor. 

"Get him out of here!" he exclaimed. "He's just damned fool enough todo something desperate if we----"

"You shut up!" barked Harvey, in a sudden access of fury. "Not a wordout of you, you big bully. "

"Get him out!" gasped Fairfax, holding his arm over his face. "Whatdid I tell you? He's crazy! Grab him, Smith! Hurry up!"

"Grab him yourself!" retorted Smith, in some haste. "He's not gunningfor me. "

What there was to be afraid of in the appearance of the littleulstered man who stood there with his hands in his pockets I cannotfor the life of me tell, but there was no doubt as to theconsternation he produced in the midst of this erstwhile jovial crowd. An abrupt demand of courtesy urged him to raise his hand to doff hishat in the presence of ladies. Twenty terrified eyes watched themovement as if ten lives hung on the result thereof. Half of theguests were standing, the other half too petrified to move. A husbandis a thing to strike terror to the heart, believe me, no matter howtrivial he may be, especially an unexpected husband. 

"Go away, Harvey!" cried Nellie, placing Fairfax between herself andthe intruder. 

"Don't do that!" growled the big man, sharply. "Do you suppose I wanthim shooting holes through me in order to get at you?"

"Is he going to shoot?" wailed one of the women, dropping thewineglass she had been holding poised near her lips all this time. Thetinkle of broken glass and the douche of champagne passed unnoticed. "For God's sake, let me get out of here!"

"Keep your seats, ladies and gents, " said Harvey, hastily, beginningto show signs of confusion. "I just dropped in to see Nellie for a fewminutes. Don't let me disturb you. She can step into the parlour, Iguess. They'll excuse you, Nellie. "

"I'll do nothing of the sort, " snapped Nellie, noting the change inhim. "Go away or I'll have a policeman called. "

He grinned. "Well, if you do, he'll catch me with the goods, " he said, mysteriously. 

"The goods?" repeated Nellie. 

"Do you want to see it?" he asked, fixing her with his eyes. As hestarted to withdraw his hand from his overcoat pocket, a general cryof alarm went up and there was a sudden shifting of positions. 

"Don't do that!" roared two or three of the men in a breath. 

"Keep that thing in your pocket!" commanded Fairfax, huskily, withoutremoving his gaze from the arm that controlled the hidden hand. 

Harvey gloated. He waved the hand that held his hat. "Don't bealarmed, ladies, " he said. "You are quite safe. I can hit a silverdollar at twenty paces, so there's no chance of anything going wild. "

"For God's sake!" gasped Fairfax. Suddenly he disappeared beneath theedge of the table. His knees struck the floor with a resoundingthump. 

"Get away from me!" shrieked the corpulent lady, kicking at him asshe fled the danger spot. 

Harvey stooped and peered under the table at his enemy, a broad grinon his face. Fairfax took it for a grin of malevolence. 

"Peek-a-boo!" called Harvey. 

"Don't shoot! For the love of Heaven, don't shoot!" yelled Fairfax. Then to the men who were edging away in quest of safety behind thesideboard, china closet, and serving table:--"Why don't you grab him, you idiots?"

Harvey suddenly realised the danger of his position. He straightenedup and jerked the revolver from his pocket, brandishing it in fullview of them all. 

"Keep back!" he shouted--a most unnecessary command. 

Those who could not crowd behind the sideboard made a rush for thebutler's pantry. Feminine shrieks and masculine howls filled the air. Chairs were overturned in the wild rush for safety. No less than threewell-dressed women were crawling on their hands and knees toward theonly means of exit from the room. 

"Telephone for the police!" yelled Fairfax, backing away onall-fours, suggesting a crawfish. 

"Stay where you are!" cried Harvey, now thoroughly alarmed by the turnof affairs. 

They stopped as if petrified. The three men who were wedged in thepantry door gave over struggling for the right of precedence andturned to face the peril. 

Once more he brandished the weapon, and once more there were shrieksand groans, this time in a higher key. 

Nellie alone stood her ground. She was desperate. Death was staringher in the face, and she was staring back as if fascinated. 

"Harvey! Harvey!" she cried, through bloodless lips. "Don't do it!Think of Phoebe! Think of your child!"

Rachel was stealing down the hall. The little Napoleon suddenlyrealised her purpose and thwarted it. 

"Come back here!" he shouted. The trembling maid could not obey for avery excellent reason. She dropped to the floor as if shot, and, failing in the effort to crawl under a low hall-seat, remained there, prostrate and motionless. 

He then addressed himself to Nellie, first cocking the pistol in amost cold-blooded manner. Paying no heed to the commands andexhortations of the men, or the whines of the women, he announced:--

"That's just what I've come here to ask you to do, Nellie; think ofPhoebe. Will you promise me to----"

"I'll promise nothing!" cried Nellie, exasperated. She was beginningto feel ridiculous, which was much worse than feeling terrified. "Youcan't bluff me, Harvey, not for a minute. "

"I'm not trying to bluff you, " he protested. "I'm simply asking you tothink. You can think, can't you? If you can't think here with all thisnoise going on, come into the parlour. We can talk it all over quietlyand--why, great Scott, I don't want to kill anybody!" Noting an abruptchange in the attitude of the men, who found some encouragement in hismanner, he added hastily, "Unless I have to, of course. Here, you!Don't get up!" The command was addressed to Fairfax. "I'd kind of liketo take a shot at you, just for fun. "

"Harvey, " said his wife, quite calmly, "if you don't put that thingin your pocket and go away I will have you locked up as sure as I'mstanding here. "

"I ask you once more to come into the parlour and talk it over withme, " said he, wavering. 

"And I refuse, " she cried, furiously. 

"Go and have it out with him, Nellie, " groaned Fairfax, lifting hishead above the edge of the table, only to lower it instantly asHarvey's hand wabbled unsteadily in a sort of attempt to draw a beadon him. 

"Well, why don't you shoot?" demanded Nellie, curtly. 

"No! No!" roared Fairfax. 

"No! No!" shrieked the women. 

"For two cents I would, " stammered Harvey, quite carried away by therenewed turmoil. 

"You would do anything for two cents, " said Nellie, sarcastically. 

"I'd shoot myself for two cents, " he wailed, dismally. "I'm no use, anyway. I'd be better off dead. "

"For God's sake let him do it, Nellie, " hissed Fairfax. "That's thething; the very thing. "

Poor Harvey suddenly came to a full realisation of the position he wasin. He had not counted on all this. Now he was in for it, and therewas no way out of it. A vast sense of shame and humiliation masteredhim. Everything before him turned gray and bleak, and then a hideousred. 

He had not meant to do a single thing he had already done. Events hadshaped themselves for him. He was surprised, dumfounded, overwhelmed. The only thought that now ran through his addled brain was that hesimply had to do something. He couldn't stand there forever, like afool, waving a pistol. In a minute or two they would all be laughingat him. It was ghastly. The wave of self-pity, of self-commiserationsubmerged him completely. Why, oh why, had he got himself into thisdreadful pickle? He had merely come to talk it over with Nellie, thatand nothing more. And now, see what he was in for!

"By jingo, " he gasped, in the depth of despair, "I'll do it! I'll makeyou sorry, Nellie; you'll be sorry when you see me lying here all shotto pieces. I've been a good husband to you. I don't deserve to dielike this, but----" His watery blue eyes took in the horrifiedexpressions on the faces of his hearers. An innate sense of delicacyarose within him. "I'll do it in the hall. "

"Be careful of the rug, " cried Nellie, gayly, not for an instantbelieving that he would carry out the threat. 

"Shall I do it here?" he asked, feebly. 

"No!" shrieked the women, putting their fingers in their ears. 

"By all means!" cried Fairfax, with a loud laugh of positive relief. 

To his own as well as to their amazement, Harvey turned the muzzle ofthe pistol toward his face. It wabbled aimlessly. Even at such shortrange he had the feeling that he would miss altogether and looked overhis shoulder to see if there was a picture or anything else on thewall that might be damaged by the stray bullet. Then he inserted themuzzle in his mouth. 

Stupefaction held his audience. Not a hand was lifted, not a breathwas drawn. For half a second his finger clung to the trigger withoutpressing it. Then he lowered the weapon. 

"I guess I better go out in the hall, where the elevator is, " hesaid. "Don't follow me. Stay where you are. You needn't worry. "

"I'll bet you ten dollars you don't do it, " said Fairfax, loudly, ashe came to his feet. 

"I don't want your dirty money, blast you, " exclaimed Harvey, withoutthinking. "Good-by, Nellie. Be good to Phoebe. Tell 'em out inBlakeville that I--oh, tell 'em anything you like. I don't give arap!"

He turned and went shambling down the hall, his back very stiff, hisears very red. 

It was necessary to step over Rachel's prostrate form. He got one footacross, when she, crazed with fear, emitted a piercing shriek andarose so abruptly that he was caught unawares. What with the start theshriek gave him and the uprising of a supposedly inanimate mass, hispersonal equilibrium was put to the severest test. Indeed, he quitelost it, going first into the air with all the sprawl of a broncobuster, and then landing solidly on his left ear where there wasn't ashred of rug to ease the impact. In a twinkling, however, he was onhis feet, apologising to Rachel. But she was crawling away as fast asher hands and knees would carry her. From the dining-room cameviolent shouts, the hated word "police" dominating the clamour. 

He slid through the door and closed it after him. A moment later hewas plunging down the steps, disdaining the elevator, which, howeverfast it may have been, could not have been swift enough for him in hispresent mood. The police! They would be clanging up to the building ina jiffy, and then what? To the station house!

Half-way down he paused to reflect. Voices above came howling down theshaft, urging the elevator man to stop him, to hold him, to do allmanner of things to him. He felt himself trapped. 

So he sat down on an upper step, leaned back against the marble wall, closed his eyes tightly, and jammed the muzzle of the revolver againstthe pit of his stomach. 

"I hate to do it, " he groaned, and then pulled the trigger. 

The hammer fell with a sharp click. He opened his eyes. If it didn'thurt any more than that he could do it with them open. Why not? In afrenzy to have it over with he pulled again and was gratified to findthat the second bullet was not a whit more painful than the first. Then he thought of the ugly spectacle he would present if he confinedthe mutilation to the abdominal region. People would shudder and say, "how horrible he looks!" So he considerately aimed the third one athis right eye. 

Even as he pulled the trigger, and the hammer fell with the usualclick, his vision centred on the black little hole in the end of thebarrel. Breathlessly he waited for the bullet to emerge. Then, all ofa sudden, he recalled that there had been no explosion. The fact hadescaped him during the throes of a far from disagreeable death. He puthis hand to his stomach. In a dumb sort of wonder he first examinedhis fingers, and, finding no gore, proceeded to a rather carefulinspection of the weapon. 

Then he leaned back and dizzily tried to remember when he had takenthe cartridges out of the thing. 

"Thank the Lord, " he said, quite devoutly. "I thought I was a goner, sure. Now, when did I take 'em out?"

The elevator shot past him, going upward. He paid no attention to it. 

It all came back to him in a flash. He remembered that he had neverloaded it at all. A loaded pistol is a very dangerous thing to haveabout the house. The little box of cartridges that came with theweapon was safely locked away at the bottom of the trunk, wrapped in athick suit of underwear for protection against concussion. 

Even as he congratulated himself on his remarkable foresight theelevator, filled with excited men, rushed past him on the way down. Heheard them saying that a dangerous lunatic was at large and that heought to be----But he couldn't hear the rest of it, the car being sofar below him. 

"By jingo!" he exclaimed, leaping to his feet in consternation. "They'll get me now. What a blamed fool I was!"

Scared out of his wits, he dashed up the steps, three at a jump, and, before he knew it, ran plump into the midst of the women who werehuddled at Nellie's landing, waiting for the shots and the death yellsfrom below. They scattered like sheep, too frightened to scream, andhe plunged through the open door into the apartment. 

"Where are you, Nellie?" he bawled. "Hide me! Don't let 'em get me. Nellie! Oh, Nellie!"

The shout would have raised the dead. Nellie was at the telephone. Shedropped the receiver and came toward him. 

"Aren't you ashamed of yourself!" she squealed, clutching his arm. "What an awful spectacle you've made of yourself--and me! Youblithering little idiot. I----"

"Where can I hide?" he whispered, hopping up and down in hiseagerness. "Hurry up! Under a bed or--anywhere. Good gracious, Nellie, they'll get me sure!"

She slammed the door. 

"I ought to let them take you and lock you up, " she said, facing him. The abject terror in his eyes went straight to her heart. "Oh, youpoor thing!" she cried, in swift compassion. "You--you wouldn't hurt afly. You couldn't. Come along! Quick! I'll do this much for you, justthis once. Never again! You can get down the back steps into the alleyif you hurry. Then beat it for home. And never let me see your faceagain. "

Three minutes later he was scuttling down the alley as fast as hiseager legs could carry him. 

Nellie was holding the front door against the thunderous assault of ahalf dozen men, giving him time to escape. All the while she wasthinking of the depositions she could take from the witnesses to hisdeliberate attempt to kill her. He had made it very easy for her. 

CHAPTER VII

THE LAWYER

He was dismally confident that he would be arrested and thrown intojail on Friday. It was always an unlucky day for him. The fact thatNellie had aided and abetted in his undignified flight down theslippery back steps did not in the least minimise the peril that stillhung like a cloud over his wretched head. Of course, he understood:she was sorry for him. It was the impulse of the moment. When she hadhad time to think it all over and to listen to the advice of Fairfaxand the others, she would certainly swear out a warrant. 

As a measure of precaution he had slyly tossed the revolver from a carwindow somewhere north of Spuyten Duyvil, and, later on at home, stealthily disposed of the box of cartridges. 

All evening long he sat huddled up by the fireplace, listening withall ears for the ominous sound of constabulary thumpings at the frontdoor. The fierce wind shrieked around the corners of the house, rattling the shutters and banging the kitchen gate, but he heardnothing, for his own heart made such a din in response to thesuccessive bursts of noise that all else seemed still by comparison. 

His efforts to amuse the perplexed Phoebe were pitiful. The child tookhim to task for countless lapses of memory in his recital of oft-toldand familiar fairy tales. 

But no one came that night. And Friday, too, dragged itself out ofexistence without a sign from Nellie or the dreaded officers of thelaw. You may be sure he did not poke his nose outside the door allthat day. Somehow he was beginning to relish the thought that shewould be gone on Sunday, gone forever, perhaps. He loved her, ofcourse, but distance at this particular time was not likely to affectthe enchantment. In fact, he was quite sure he would worship her agreat deal more comfortably if she were beyond the border of theState. 

The thought of punishment quite overshadowed a previous dread as tohow he was going to provide for Phoebe and himself up to the time ofassuming the job in Davis' drug store. He had long since come to theconclusion that if Nellie persisted in carrying out her plan todivorce him he could not conscientiously accept help from her, norcould he expect to retain custody of the child unless by his ownefforts he made suitable provision for her. His one great hope in theface of this particular difficulty had rested on the outcome of thevisit to her apartment, the miserable result of which we know. Notonly had he upset all of his fondest calculations, but he had heapedunthinkable ruin in the place he had set aside for them. 

There was nothing consoling in the situation, no matter how he lookedat it. More than once he regretted the emptiness of that confoundedcylinder. If there had been a single bullet in the thing his troubleswould now be over. Pleasing retrospect! But not for all the money inthe world would he again subject himself to a similar risk. 

It made him shudder to even think of it. It was hard enough for him torealise that he had had the monumental courage to try it on that neverto be forgotten occasion. As a matter of fact, he was rather proud ofit, which wouldn't have been at all possible if he had succeeded inthe cowardly attempt. 

Suppose, thought he with a qualm--suppose there had been a bullet! Itwas now Saturday. His funeral would be held on Saturday. By Saturdaynight he would be in a grave--a lonesome, desolate grave. Nellie wouldhave seen to that, so that she could get away on Sunday. Ugh! It wasmost unpleasant!

The day advanced. His spirits were rising. If nothing happened betweenthen and midnight he was reasonably secure from arrest. 

But in the middle of the day the blow fell. Not the expected blow, butone that stunned him and left him more miserable than anything else inthe world could have done. 

There came a polite knock at the door. Annie admitted apleasant-faced, rather ceremonious young man, who said he had businessof the utmost importance to transact with Mr. --Mr. --He glanced at apaper which he drew from his pocket, and supplying the name asked ifthe gentleman was in. 

Harvey was tiptoeing toward the dining-room, with Phoebe at his heels, when the stranger entered the library. 

"Pardon me, " called the young man, with what seemed to Harveyunnecessary haste and emphasis. "Just a moment, please!"

Harvey stopped, chilled to the marrow. 

"It was all a joke, " he said, quickly. "Just a little joke of mine. Ha! Ha!" It was a sepulchral laugh. 

"I am John Buckley, from the offices of Barnes & Canby, representingMiss Duluth, your wife, I believe? It isn't a pleasant duty I have toperform Mr. --Mr--er--but, of course, you understand we are acting inthe interests of our client and if we can get together on this----"

"Can't you come some other day?" stammered Harvey, holding Phoebe'shand very tightly in his. "I'm--I'm not well to-day. We--we arewaiting now for the health officer to--to see whether it's smallpox orjust a rash of----"

The pleasant young gentleman laughed. 

"All the more necessary why we should settle the question at once. Ifit is smallpox the child would be quarantined with you--that would beunfortunate. You don't appear to have a rash, however. "

"It hasn't got up to my face yet, " explained Harvey, feebly. "Youought to see my body. It's----"

"I've had it, " announced the young man, glibly; "so I'm immune. " Hewinked. 

"What do you want?" demanded Harvey, bracing himself for the worst. "Out with it. Let's see your star. "

"Oh, I'm not a cop. I'm a lawyer. "

The other swallowed noisily. 

"A lawyer?"

"We represent Miss Duluth. I'll get down to tacks right away, ifyou'll permit me to sit down. " He took a chair. 

"Tacks?" queried Harvey, a retrospective grin appearing on his lips. "Gee! I wish I'd thought to put a couple----But, excuse me, I can'ttalk without my lawyer being present. "

The visitor stared. "You--do you mean to say you have retainedcounsel?"

"The best in New York, " lied Harvey. 

Buckley gave a sigh of relief. He knew a lie when he heard one. 

"I'd suggest that you send the little girl out of the room. We cantalk better if we are alone. "

After Phoebe's reluctant departure, the visitor bluntly asked Harveywhich he preferred, State's prison or an amicable adjustment withoutdishonour. 

"Neither, " said Harvey, moistening his lips. 

Thereupon Mr. Buckley calmly announced that his client, Miss Duluth, was willing to forego the pleasure of putting him behind the bars oncondition that he surrendered at once the person of their child--theirjoint child, he put it, so that Harvey might not be unnecessarilyconfused--to be reared, educated, and sustained by her, without let orhindrance, from that time forward, so on and so forth; a bewilderingrigmarole that meant nothing to the stupefied father, who only knewthat they wanted to take his child away from him. 

"Moreover, " said Mr. Buckley, "our client has succeeded in cancellingthe lease on this cottage and has authorised the owner to takepossession on the first of the month--next Wednesday, that is. Mondaymorning, bright and early, the packers and movers will be here to takeall of her effects away. Tuesday night, we hope, the house will bequite empty and ready to be boarded up. Of course, Mr. --Mr. --er--, youwill see to it that whatever trifling effects you may have about theplace are removed by that time. After that, naturally, little MissPhoebe will be homeless unless provision is made for her by--er--bythe court. We hope to convince you that it will be better for her ifthe question is not referred to a court of justice. Your own goodsense will point the alternative. Do I make myself quite clear toyou?"

"No, " said Harvey, helplessly. 

"Well, I'll be a little more explicit, " said the lawyer, grimly. "Awarrant will be issued for your arrest before two o'clock to-day ifyou do not grasp my meaning before that hour. It is twelve-ten now. Doyou think you can catch the idea in an hour and fifty minutes?"

Harvey was thoughtful. "What is the smallest sentence they can give meif I--if I stand trial?"

"That depends, " said Mr. Buckley, slightly taken aback, but withoutsubmitting an explanation. "You don't want to bring disgrace on thechild by being branded as a jailbird, do you?"

"Nellie won't have the heart to put me in jail, " groaned the unhappylittle man. "She--she just can't do it. She knows I'd die for her. She----"

"But she isn't the State of New York, " explained her counsel, briskly. "The State hasn't anything in the shape of a heart. Now, I'm here tosettle the matter without a contest, if that's possible. If you wantto fight, all right. You know just what you'll get. Besides, isn't itperfectly clear to you that Miss Duluth doesn't want to put you injail? That's her idea, pure and simple. I don't mind confessing thatour firm insisted for a long time on giving you up to the authorities, but she wouldn't have it that way. She wants her little girl, that'sall. Isn't that perfectly fair?"

"She's--she's going to give up the house?" murmured Harvey, passinghis hand over his eyes. 

"Certainly. "

"It's a mighty inconvenient time for us to--to look for anotherplace----"

"That's just what I've been saying to you, " urged Buckley. "TheWeather Bureau says we'll have zero weather for a month or two. Ishudder to think of that poor child out in----"

"Oh, Lord!" came almost in a wail from the lips of Phoebe's father. Hecovered his face with his hands. Mr. Buckley, unseen, smiledtriumphantly. 

At four o'clock Phoebe, with all her childish penates, was driven tothe station by Mr. Buckley, who, it would appear, had come preparedfor the emergency. Before leaving he gave the two servants a month'swages and a two weeks' notice dating from the 18th of December andleft with Harvey sufficient money to pay up all the outstanding billsof the last month--with a little left over. 

We draw a curtain on the parting that took place in the little libraryjust before the cab drove away. 

Phoebe was going to Reno. 

Long, long after the departure her father lifted his half-closed blueeyes from the coals in the grate and discovered that the room wasice-cold. 

 * * * * *

He understood the habits of astute theatrical managers so well by thistime that he did not have to be told that the company would journey toChicago by one of the slow trains. The comfort and convenience of theplayer is seldom considered by the manager, who, as a rule, when thereis time to spare, transports his production by the least expensiveway. Harvey knew that Nellie and the "Up in the Air" company wouldpass through Tarrytown on the pokiest day train leaving New York overthe Central. There was, of course, the possibility that the affluentNellie might take the eighteen-hour train, but it was somewhatremote. 

Sunday morning found him at the Tarrytown station, awaiting thearrival or the passing of the train bearing the loved ones who werecasting him off. He was there early, bundled in his ulster, an oldBlakeville cap pulled down over his ears, a limp cigarette between hislips. A few of the station employés knew him and passed the time ofday. 

"Going in rather early, ain't you, Mr. --Mr. --" remarked the stationmaster, clapping his hands to generate warmth. 

"No, " said Harvey, leaving the inquirer in the dark as to whether hereferred to a condition or a purpose. 

A couple of hours and a dozen trains went by. Harvey, having exhaustedhis supply of cigarettes, effected the loan of one from the ticketagent. 

"Waiting for some one, sir?" asked that worthy. "Or are you just downto see the cars go by?"

"What time does the Chicago train go through?" asked Harvey. 

"Any particular one?"

"No; I'm not particular. "

"There's one at eleven-forty. "

"I'm much obliged. "

He was panic-stricken when the train at last appeared and gaveunmistakable signs of stopping at Tarrytown. Moved by an inexplicableimpulse, he darted behind a pile of trunks. His dearest hope had beenthat Phoebe might be on the lookout for him as the cars whizzedthrough, and that she would waft a final kiss to him. But it was goingto stop! He hadn't counted on that. It was most embarrassing. 

From his hiding place he watched the long line of sleepers roll by, slower and slower, until with a wheeze they came to a full stop. Hiseager eyes took in every window that passed. There was no sign ofPhoebe. Somewhat emboldened, he ventured forth from shelter andstrolled along the platform for a more deliberate scrutiny of thewindows. 

The feeling of disappointment was intense. He had never knownloneliness so great as this which came to him now. The droop to hisshoulders became a little more pronounced as he turned dejectedly tore-enter the waiting-room. The train began to move out as he nearedthe corner of the building. The last coach crept by. He watched itdully. 

A shrill cry caught his ear. His eyes, suddenly alert, focussedthemselves on the observation platform of the private car as it pickedup speed and began the diminishing process. Braced against the garishbrass bars that enclosed the little platform was Phoebe, in her whitefur coat and hood, her mittened fingers clutching the rail, abovewhich her rosy face appeared as the result of eager tiptoeing. Theexcellent Rachel stood behind the child, cold and unsmiling. 

"Hello, daddy!" screamed Phoebe, managing to toss him a kiss, just ashe had hoped and expected. 

The response cracked in his throat. It was a miserable croak that hesent back, but he blew her a dozen kisses. 

"Good-bye, daddy!" came the shrill adieu, barely audible above theclatter of the receding train. 

He stood quite still until the last coach vanished up the track. Thetears on his cheeks were frozen. 

Some one was speaking to him. 

"Ain't you going West with 'em, Mr. --, Mr. --?" queried the baggagemaster. 

Harvey gazed at him dumbly for a moment or two. Then he lifted hischin. 

"I--I've got to wait over a few days to see to the packing and storingof my household effects, " he said, briskly. Then he trudged up thehill. 

Sure enough, the packers appeared "bright and early" Monday morning, just as Buckley had said they would. By nine o'clock the house wasupside down and by noon it was full of excelsior, tar paper, andcrating materials. The rasp of the saw and the bang of the hammerresounded throughout the little cottage. Burly men dragged helplessand unresisting articles of furniture about as if they had a personalgrudge against each separate piece, and pounded them, and drove nailsinto them, and mutilated them, and scratched them, and splinteredthem, and after they were completely conquered marked their pine boardcoffins with the name "Nellie Duluth, " after which they were ready forthe fireproof graveyard in Harlem. 

Dazed and unsteady, Harvey watched the proceedings with the air of onewho superintends. He gave a few instructions, offered one or twosuggestions--principally as to the state of the weather--and was onthe jump all day long to keep out of the way of the energetic workmen. He had seen Marceline at the Hippodrome on one memorable occasion. Somehow he reminded himself of the futile but nimble clown, who wasalways in the way and whose good intentions invariably were attendedby disaster. 

The foreman of the gang, doubtless with a shrewd purpose in mind, opened half the windows in the house, thus forcing his men to workfast and furiously or freeze. Harvey almost perished in the icydraughts. He shut the front door fifty times or more, and wasbeginning to sniffle and sneeze when Bridget took pity on him andinvited him into the kitchen. He hugged the cook stove for severalhours, mutely watching the two servants through the open door of theirjoint bedroom off the kitchen while they stuffed their meagrebelongings into a couple of trunks. 

At last it occurred to him that it would be well to go upstairs andpack his own trunk before the workmen got to asking questions. Hecarried his set of Dickens upstairs, not without interrogation, andstored the volumes away at the bottom of his trunk. So few were hisindividual belongings that he was hard put to fill the trays compactlyenough to prevent the shifting of the contents. When the job was donehe locked the trunk, tied a rope around it and then sat down upon itto think. Had he left anything out? He remembered something. He untiedthe knots, unlocked the trunk, shifted half of the contents and put inhis fishing tackle and an onyx clock Nellie had given him forChristmas two years before. 

Later on he repeated the operation and made room for a hand saw, anauger, a plane, and a hatchet; also a smoking-jacket she had givenhim, and a lot of paper dolls Phoebe had left behind. (Late thatnight, after the lights were out, he remembered the framed motto, "GodBless Our Home, " which his dear old mother had worked for him in yarnsof variegated hues while they were honeymooning in Blakeville. Thehome was very cold and still, and the floor was strewn with nails, buthe got out of bed and put the treasure in the top tray of the trunk. )

Along about four in the afternoon he experienced a sensation ofuneasiness--even alarm. It began to look as if the workmen would havethe entire job completed by nightfall. In considerable trepidation heaccosted the foreman. 

"If it's just the same to you I'd rather you wouldn't pack the bedsuntil to-morrow--that is, of course, if you are coming backto-morrow. "

"Maybe we'll get around to 'em and maybe we won't, " said the foreman, carelessly. "We've got to pack the kitchen things to-morrow and thechina. "

"You see, it's this way, " said Harvey. "I've got to sleep somewhere!"

"I see, " said the foreman, and went on with his work, leaving Harveyin doubt. 

"Have a cigar?" he asked, after a doleful pause. The man took it andlooked at it keenly. 

"I'll smoke it after a while, " he said. 

"Do the best you can about the bed in the back room upstairs, " saidHarvey, engagingly. 

An express wagon came at five o'clock and removed the servants'trunks. A few minutes later the two domestics, be-hatted and cloaked, came up to say good-bye to him. 

"You're not leaving to-day?" he cried, aghast. 

"If it's just the same to you, sor, " said Bridget. "We've both gotplaces beginnin' to-morry. "

"But who'll cook my----"

"Niver you worry about that, sor; I've left a dozen av eggs, somebacon, rolls, and----"

"All right. Good-bye, " broke in the master, turning away. 

"Good luck, sor, " said Bridget, amiably. Then they went away. 

His dismal reflections were broken by the foreman, who found him inthe kitchen. 

"We'll be back early in the morning and clean up everything. The vanwill be here at ten. Is everything here to go to the warehouse? Inotice some things that look as though they might belong to youpersonally. "

There were a few pieces of furniture and bric-à-brac that Harvey couldclaim as his own. He stared gloomily at the floor for a long time, thinking. Of what use were they to him now? And where was he to putthem in case he claimed them?

"I guess you'd better store everything, " he said, dejectedly. "They--they all go together. "

"The--your trunk, sir; how about that?"

"If you think you've got room for it, I----"

"Sure we have. "

"Take it, too. I'm going to pack what clothes I need in a suitcase. Somuch easier to carry than a trunk. " He was unconsciously funny, anddid not understand the well-meant guffaw of the foreman. 

It was a dreary, desolate night that he spent in the topsy-turvycottage. He was quite alone except for the queer shapes and shadowsthat haunted him. When he was downstairs he could hear strangewhisperings above; when he was upstairs the mutterings were below. Things stirred and creaked that had never shown signs of animationbefore. The coals in the fireplace spat with a malignant fury, as ifblown upon by evil spirits lurking in the chimney until he went to bedso that they might come forth to revel in the gloom. The howl of thewind had a different note, a wail that seemed to come from a child inpain; forbidding sounds came up from the empty cellar; always therewas something that stood directly behind him, ready to lay on aghostly hand. He crouched in the chair, feeling never so small, neverso impotent as now. The chair was partially wrapped for crating. Everytime he moved there was a crackle of paper that sounded like therattle of thunder before the final ear-splitting crash. As still as amouse he sat and listened for new sounds, more sinister than thosethat had gone before; and, like the mouse, he jumped with eachrecurring sound. 

Towering crates seemed on the verge of toppling over upon him, boxesand barrels appeared to draw closer together to present a barrieragainst any means of escape; cords and ropes wriggled with life as hestared at them, serpentine things that kept on creeping toward him, never away. 

Oh, for the sound of Phoebe's voice!

"Quoth the raven, nevermore!" That sombre sentence haunted him. Hetried to close his ears against it, but to no purpose. It crept upfrom some inward lurking place in his being, crooning a hundredcadences in spite of all that he could do to change the order of histhoughts. 

Far in the night he dashed fearfully up to his dismantled bedroom, aflickering candle in his hand. He had gone about the place to see thatall of the doors and windows were fastened. Removing his shoes and hiscoat, he hurriedly crawled in between the blankets and blew out thelight. Sleep would not come. He was sobbing. He got up twice andlighted the candle, once to put away the motto, again to take out ofthe trunk the cabinet size photograph of himself and Nellie and thebaby, taken when the latter was three years old. Hugging this to hisbreast, he started back to bed. 

A sudden thought staggered him. For a long time he stood in the middleof the room, shivering as he debated the great question this thoughtpresented. At last, with a shudder, he urged his reluctant feet tocarry him across the room to the single gas jet. Closing his eyes heturned on the gas full force and then leaped into the bed, holding theportrait to his heart. Then he waited for the end of everything. 

When he opened his eyes broad daylight was streaming in upon him. Someone was pounding on the door downstairs. He leaped out of bed andbegan to pull on his shoes. 

Suddenly it occurred to him that by all rights he should be lyingthere stiff and cold, suffocated by the escaping gas. He sniffed theair. There was no odour of gas. With a gasp of alarm he rushed overand turned off the stopcock, a cold perspiration coming out all overhim. 

"Gee, I hope I'm in time!" he groaned aloud. "I don't want to die. I--I--it's different in the daytime. The darkness did it. I hopeI'm----" Then, considerably puzzled, he interrupted himself to turnthe thing on again. He stood on his toes to smell the tip. "By jingo, I remember now, that fellow turned it off in the meter yesterday. Oh, Lord; what a close call I've had!"

He was so full of glee when he opened the door to admit the packersthat they neglected, in their astonishment, to growl at him forkeeping them standing in the cold for fifteen or twenty minutes. 

"Thought maybe you'd gone and done it, " said the foreman. "Took poisonor turned on the gas, or something. You was mighty blue yesterday, Mr. --Mr. Duluth. "

With the arrival of the van he set off to pay the bills due thetradespeople in town, returning before noon with all the receipts, andsomething like $20 left over. The world did not look so dark anddreary to him now. In his mind's eye he saw himself rehabilitated inthe sight of the scoffers, prospering ere long to such an extent thatnot only would he be able to reclaim Phoebe, but even Nellie might bepersuaded to throw herself on his neck and beg for reinstatement inhis good graces. With men like Harvey the ill wind never blows long orsteadily; it blows the hardest under cover of night. The sunshinetakes the keen, bitter edge off it, and it becomes a balmy zephyr. 

Already he was planning the readjustment of his fortunes. 

At length the van was loaded. His suitcase sat on the front porch, puny and pathetic. The owner of the house was there, superintendingthe boarding up of the windows and doors. Harvey stood in the middleof the walk, looking on with a strange yearning in his heart. All ofhis worldly possessions reposed in that humble bag, save the cottonumbrella that he carried in his hand. A cotton umbrella, with themercury down to zero!

"Well, I'm sorry you're leaving, " said the owner, pocketing the keysas he came up to the little man. "Can I give you a lift in my cutterdown to the station?"

"If it isn't too much bother, " said Harvey, blinking his eyes veryrapidly. 

"You're going to the city, I suppose. "

"The city?"

"New York. "

"Oh, " said Harvey, wide-eyed and thoughtful, "I--I thought you meantBlakeville. I'm going out there for a visit with my Uncle Peter. He'sthe leading photographer in Blakeville. My mother's brother. No, I'mnot going to New York. Not on your life!"

All the way to the station he was figuring on how far the twentydollars would go toward paying his fare to Blakeville. How far couldhe ride on the cars, and how far would he have to walk? And what wouldhis crabbed old uncle say to an extended visit in case he got toBlakeville without accident?

He bought some cigarettes at the newsstand and sat down to wait forthe first train to turn up, westward bound. 

CHAPTER VIII

BLAKEVILLE

If by any chance you should happen to stop off in the sleepy town ofBlakeville, somewhere west of Chicago, you would be directed at onceto the St. Nicholas Hotel, not only the leading hostelry of the city, but--to quote the advertisement in the local newspaper--the principalhotel in that Congressional district. After you had been conducted tothe room with a bath--for I am sure you would insist on having it ifit were not already occupied, which wouldn't be likely--you wouldcross over to the window and look out upon Main Street. Directlyacross the way you would observe a show window in which huge bottlesfilled with red, yellow, and blue fluids predominated. The sign abovethe door would tell you that it was a drug store, if you neededanything more illuminating than the three big bottles. 

"Davis' drug store, " you would say to your wife, if she happened to bewith you, and if you have been at all interested in the history ofMr. --Mr. --Now, what is his name?--you would doubtless add, "It seemsto me I have heard of the place before. " And then you would stare hardto see if you could catch a glimpse of the soda-water dispenser, whosebase of operations was just inside the door to the left, a marblestructure that glistened with white and silver, and created within youat once a longing for sarsaparilla or vanilla and the delicious aftereffect of stinging gases coming up through the nostrils, notinfrequently accompanied by tears of exquisite pain--a pungent pain, if you please. 

At the rush periods of the day you could not possibly have seen himfor the crowd of thirsty people who obstructed the view. Everybody intown flocked to Davis' for their chocolate sundaes and cherryphosphates. Was not Harvey behind the counter once more? With all thenew-fangled concoctions from gay New York, besides a few noveltiesfrom Paris, and a wonderful assortment of what might well have beencalled prestidigitatorial achievements!

He had a new way of juggling an egg phosphate that was worth goingmiles to see, and as for the manner in which he sprinkled nutmeg overthe surface--well! no Delsartian movement ever was so full of grace. 

Yes, he was back at the old place in Davis'. For a year and a half hehad been there. So prosperous was his first summer behind the "sodacounter" that the owner of the place agreed with him that the fountaincould be kept running all winter, producing hot chocolate, beef tea, and all that sort of thing. Just to keep the customers from gettingout of the habit, argued Harvey in support of his plan--and his job. 

You may be interested to learn how he came back to Blakeville. He wasa fortnight getting there from Tarrytown. His railroad ticket carriedhim to Cleveland. From that city he walked to Chicago, his purposebeing to save a few dollars so that he might ride into Blakeville. Hisfeet were so sore and swollen when he finally hobbled into his UnclePeter's art studio, on Main Street, that he couldn't get his shoes onfor forty-eight hours after once taking them off. He confessed to abit of high living in his time, lugubriously admitting to his unclethat he feared he had a touch of the gout. He was subject to it, confound it. Beastly thing, gout. But you can't live on lobster andterrapin and champagne without paying the price. 

His uncle, a crusty and unimpressionable bachelor, was not long ingetting the truth out of him. To Harvey's unbounded surprise the oldphotographer sympathised with him. Instead of kicking him out he tookhim to his bosom, so to speak, and commiserated with him. 

"I feel just as sorry for a married man, Harvey, " said he, "as I dofor a half-starved dog. I'm always going out of my way to feed some ofthese cast-off dogs around town, so why shouldn't I do the same for apoor devil of a husband? I'll make you comfortable until you get intoDavis', but don't you ever let on to these damned women that you're afailure, or that you're strapped, or that that measly little wife ofyours gave you the sack. No, sir! Remember who you are. You are mynephew. I won't say as I'm proud of you, but, by thunder! I don't wantanybody in Blakeville to know that I'm ashamed of you. If I feel thatway about you, it's my own secret and it's nobody's business. So youjust put on a bold front and nobody need know. You can be quite sureI won't tell on you, to have people saying that my poor dead sister'sboy wasn't good enough for Ell Barkley or any other woman that everlived. 

"But it's a lesson to you. Don't--for God's sake, don't--ever letanother one of 'em get her claws on you! Here's ten dollars. Go outand buy some ten-cent cigars at Rumley's, and smoke 'em whereeverybody can see you. Ten-centers, mind you; not two-fers, the kind Ismoke. And get a new pair of shoes at Higgs'. And invite me to eata--an expensive meal at the St. Nicholas. It can't cost more'n adollar, no matter how much we order, but you can ask for lobster andterrapin, and raise thunder because they haven't got 'em, whateverthey are. Then in a couple of days you can say you're going to help meout during the busy season, soliciting orders for crayon portraits. I'll board and lodge you here and give you four dollars a week tosplurge on. The only thing I ask in return is that you'll tell peopleI'm a smart man for never having married. That's all!"

You may be quite sure that Harvey took to the place as a duck takesto water. Inside of a week after his arrival--or, properly speaking, his appearance in Blakeville, for you couldn't connect the two onaccount of the gout--he was the most talked-of, most envied man in theplace. In the cigar stores, poolrooms, and at the St. Nicholas he waswont to regale masculine Blakeville with tales of high life in theTenderloin that caused them to fairly shiver from attacks of theimagination, and subsequently to go home and tell their women folkwhat a gay Lothario he was, with the result that the interest in theerstwhile drug clerk spread to the other sex with such remarkableunanimity that no bit of gossip was complete without him. Every oneaffected his society, because every one wanted to hear what he had tosay of the gay world on Manhattan Island; the life behind the scenesof the great theatres, the life in the million dollar cafés andhotels, the life in the homes of fashionable New Yorkers, --with whomhe was on perfectly amiable terms, --the life in Wall Street. Some ofthem wanted to know all about Old Trinity, others were interested inthe literary atmosphere of Gotham, while others preferred to hearabout the fashions. But the great majority hungered for the details ofconvivial escapades--and he saw to it that they were amply satisfied. Especially were they interested in stories concerning the genus"broiler. " Oh, he was really a devil of a fellow. 

When the time came for him to begin his work as a solicitor for crayonportraits his reputation was such that not only was he able to gainadmittance to every home visited, but he was allowed to remain andchat as long as he pleased, sometimes obtaining an order, but alwaysbeing invited to call again after the lady of the house had had timeto talk it over with her husband. 

Sometimes he would lie awake in his bed trying in vain to remember thetales he had told and wondering if the people really believed him. Then he was prone to contrast his fiction with the truth as he knewit, and to blame himself for not having lived the brightly paintedlife when he had the opportunity. He almost wept when he thought ofwhat he had missed. His imagination carried him so far that he cursedhis mistaken rectitude and longed for one lone and indeliblereminiscence which he could cherish as a real tribute to thatbeautiful thing called vice!

In answer to all questions he announced that poor Nellie had beenadvised to go West for her health. Of the real situation he saidnothing. 

No day passed that did not bring with it the longing for a letter fromNellie or a word from Phoebe. Down in his heart he was grieving. Hewanted them, both of them. The hope that Nellie would appeal to himfor forgiveness grew smaller as the days went by, and yet he did notlet it die. His loyal imagination kept it alive, fed it with dailyprayers and endless vistas of a reconstructed happiness for all ofthem. 

Toward the end of his first summer at Davis' he was served with thenotice that Nellie had instituted proceedings against him in Reno. Itwas in the days of Reno's early popularity as a rest cure for thosesuffering from marital maladies; impediments and complications werenot so annoying as they appear to be in these latter times of ours. There was also a legal notice printed in the Blakeville _Patriot_. 

The shock laid him up for a couple of days. If his uncle meant toencourage him by maintaining an almost incessant flow of invectives, he made a dismal failure of it. He couldn't convince the heartsickHarvey that Nellie was "bad rubbish" and that he was lucky to be ridof her. No amount of cajolery could make him believe that he was agood deal happier than he had ever been before in all his life; hewasn't happy and he couldn't be fooled into believing he was. He wasmiserable--desperately miserable. Looking back on his futile attemptsto take his own life, he realised now that he had missed two goldenchances to be supremely happy. How happy he could be if he were onlydead! He was rather glad, of course, that he failed with the pistol, because it would have been such a gory way out of it, but it was verystupid of him not to have gone out pleasantly--even immaculately--bythe other route. 

But it was too late to think of doing it now. He was under contractwith Mrs. Davis, Mr. Davis having passed on late in the spring, and hecould not desert the widow in the midst of the busy season. His lastcommission as a crayon solicitor had come through Mrs. Davis, twomonths after the demise of Blakeville's leading apothecary. Sheordered a life-size portrait of her husband, to be hung in the store, and they wept together over the prescription--that is to say, over thecolour of the cravat and the shade of the sparse thatch that coveredthe head of the departed. Mrs. Davis never was to forget hissympathetic attitude. She never quite got over explaining theoversight that had deprived him of the distinction of being one of thepall-bearers, but she made up for it in a measure by insisting onopening the soda fountain at least a month earlier than was customarythe next spring, and in other ways, as you will see later on. 

Just as he was beginning to rise, phoenixlike, from the ashes of hisdespond, the _Patriot_ reprinted the full details of Nellie'scomplaint as they appeared in a New York daily. For a brief spell heshrivelled up with shame and horror; he could not look any one in theface. Nellie's lawyers had made the astounding, outrageous charge ofinfidelity against him!

Infidelity!

He was stunned. 

But just as he was on the point of resigning his position in thestore, after six months of glorious triumph, the business began topick up so tremendously that he wondered what had got into people. 

His uncle chucked him in the ribs and called him a gay dog! Men camein and ordered sundaes who had never tasted one before, and they alllooked at him in a strangely respectful way. Women smirked and giggledand called him a naughty fellow, and said they really ought not to lethim wait on them. 

All of a sudden it dawned on him that he was "somebody. " He was arake!

The New York paper devoted two full columns to his perfidiousbehaviour in the Tenderloin. For the first time in his life he stoodin the limelight. Nellie charged him with other trifling things, suchas failure to provide, desertion, cruelty; but none of these wassufficiently blighting to take the edge off the delicious clause whichlifted him into the seventh heaven of a new found self-esteem! Hisfirst impulse had been to cry out against the diabolical falsehood, todeny the allegation, to fight the case to the bitter end. But onsecond thought he concluded to maintain a dignified silence, especially as he came to realise that he now possessed a definiteentity not only in Blakeville, but in the world at large. He was arecognised human being! People who had never heard of him before werenow saying, "What a jolly scamp he is! What a scalawag!" Oh, it wasgood to come into his own, even though he reached it by a crooked andheretofore undesirable thoroughfare. Path was not the word--it was athoroughfare, lined by countless staring, admiring fellow creatures, all of whom pointed him out and called him by his own name. 

Mothers cautioned their daughters, commanding them to have nothing todo with him, and then went with them to Davis' to see that thecommands were obeyed. Fathers held him up to their sons as a dreadfulwarning, and then made it a point to drop in and tell him what theythought of him with a sly wink that pleased and never offended him. 

He mildly protested against the sensational charge when questionedabout it, saying that Nellie was mistaken, that her jealousy led herto believe a lot of things that were not true, and that he feltdreadfully cut up about the whole business, as it was likely to createa wrong impression in New York. Of course, he went on, no one inBlakeville believed the foolish thing! But in New York--well, theywere likely to believe anything of a fellow there!

He moved in the very centre of a great white light. Reporters came inevery day and asked him if there was anything new, hoping, of course, for fresh developments in the great divorce case. Lawyers dropped into hint that they would like to take care of his interests. But therenever was anything new, and his New York lawyers were perfectlycapable of handling his affairs, particularly as he had decided toenter no general denial to the charges. He would let her get herdivorce if she wanted it so badly as all that!

"I'd fight it, " said the editor of the _Patriot_, counselling him oneafternoon. 

"You wouldn't if you had a child to consider, " said Harvey, resignedly, quite overlooking the fact that there were nine growingchildren in the editor's household. 

"She's too young to know anything about it, " argued the other, earnestly. 

Harvey shook his head. "You don't know what it is to be a father, Mr. Brinkley. It's a terrible responsibility. "

Mr. Brinkley snorted. "I should say it is!"

"You'd think of your children if your wife sued you for divorce andcharged you with----"

"I'd want my children to know I was innocent, " broke in the editor, warmly. 

"They wouldn't believe it if the lawyers got to cross-examining you, "said Harvey, meaning well, but making a secret enemy of Mr. Brinkley, who thought he knew more of a regrettable visit to Chicago than hepretended. 

Late in the fall several important epoch-making things happened toHarvey. Nellie was granted a divorce and the custody of the child. Hisuncle fell ill and died of pneumonia, and he found himself the soleheir to a thriving business and nearly three thousand dollars in bank. Mrs. Davis blandly proposed matrimony to him, now that he was free andshe nearing the halfway stage of mourning. 

He was somewhat dazed by these swift turns of the wheel of fate. 

His first thought on coming into the fortune was of Phoebe, and theopportunities it laid open to him where she was concerned. His unclehad been dilatory in the matter of dying, but his nephew did not haveit in his kindly heart to hold it up against the old gentleman. Still, if he had passed on a fortnight earlier, the decree might havebeen anticipated by a few days and Phoebe at least saved for him. Seeing that the poor old gentleman had to die anyway, it seemed ratherinconsiderate of fate to put it off so long as it did. As it was, hewould have to make the best of it and institute some sort ofproceedings to get possession of the child for half of the year at theshortest. 

He went so far as to slyly consult an impecunious lawyer about thematter, with the result that a long letter was sent to Nellie settingout the facts and proposing an amicable arrangement in lieu of moresinister proceedings. Harvey added a postscript to the lawyer'sdiplomatic rigmarole, conveying a plain hint to Nellie that, inasmuchas he was now quite well-to-do, she might fare worse than to come backto him and begin all over again. 

The letter was hardly on its way to Reno, with instructions toforward, when he began to experience a deep and growing sense ofshame; it was a pusillanimous trick he was playing on his poor oldwoman-hating uncle. Contemplating a resumption of the conjugal statealmost before the old gentleman was cold in his grave! It wascontemptible. In no little dread he wondered if his uncle would comeback to haunt him. There was, at any rate, no getting away from thegruesome conviction, ludicrous as it may seem, that he would beresponsible for the brisk turning over of Uncle Peter, if nothingmore. 

On top of this spell of uneasiness came the surprising proposition ofMrs. Davis. Between the suspense of not hearing from Nellie and thedread of offending the dead he was already in a sharp state of nerves. But when Mrs. Davis gently confided to him that she needed a live manto conduct her affairs without being actuated by a desire to earn aweekly salary he was completely stupefied. 

"I'm afraid I don't understand, Mrs. Davis, " he said, beginning toperspire very freely. 

They were seated in the parlour of her house in Brown Street. She hadsent for him. 

"Of course, Harvey, it is most unseemly of me to suggest it at thepresent time, seeing as I have only been in mourning for three months, but I thought perhaps you'd feel more settled like if you knew justwhat to expect of me. "

"Just what to expect?"

"Yes; so's you could rest easy in your mind. It would have to be quitea ways off yet, naturally, so's people wouldn't say mean things aboutus. They might, you know, considering the way you carried on withwomen in New York. Not for the world would I have 'em say or eventhink that anything had been going on between you and me prior to thetime of Mr. Davis' death, but--but you know how people will talk ifthey get a chance. For that reason I think we'd better wait until thefull period of mourning is over. That's only about a year longer, andit would stop----"

"Are--are you asking me to--to marry you, Mrs. Davis?" gasped Harvey, clutching the arms of the chair. 

"Well, Harvey, " said she, kindly, "I am making it easy for you to doit yourself. "

"Holy----" began he, but strangled back the word "Mike, " rememberingthat Mrs. Davis, a devout church member, abhorred anything thatbordered on the profane. 

"Holy what?" asked she, rather coyly for a lady who was not likely tosee sixty again unless reincarnated. 

"Matrimony, " he completed, as if inspired. 

"I know I am a few years older than you, Harvey, but you are so verymuch older than I in point of experience that I must seem a mere girlto you. We could----"

"Mrs. Davis, I--I can't do it, " he blurted out, mopping his brow. "Isuppose it means I'll lose my job in the store, but, honestly, I can'tdo it. I'm much obliged. It's awfully nice of you to----"

"Don't be too hasty, " said she, composedly. "As I said in thebeginning, I want some one to conduct the store in Mr. Davis' place. But I want that person to be part owner of it. No hired man, youunderstand? Now, how would a new sign over the door look, with yourname right after Davis? Davis &--er--er----Oh, dear me!"

"I'll--I'll buy half of the store, " floundered he. "I want to buy ahalf interest. "

"I won't sell, " said she, flatly. "I'm determined that the store shallnever go out of the family while I am alive. There's only one way foryou to get around that, and that's by becoming a part of the family. "

"Why--why, Mrs. Davis, I'm only thirty years old. You surely don'tmean to say you'd--you'd marry a kid like me? Let's see. My mother, if she was alive, wouldn't be as old as----"

"Never mind!" interrupted she, with considerable asperity. "We won'tdiscuss your mother, if you please. Now, Harvey, don't be cruel. I amvery fond of you. I will overlook all those scandalous things you didin New York. I can and will close my eyes to the wicked life you ledthere. I won't even ask their names--and that's more than most womenwould promise! I won't----"

"I can't do it, " he repeated two or three times in rapid succession. 

"Think it over, Harvey dear, " said she, impressively. 

"I'll buy a half interest if you'll let me, but I'll be doggoned ifI'll marry a stepmother for Phoebe, not for the whole shebang!"

"Stepmother!" she repeated, shrilly. "I don't intend to be astepmother!"

"Maybe I meant grandmother, " he stammered in confusion. "I'm sorattled. "

"Nellie has got Phoebe. She's not yours any longer. How can I be herstepmother? Answer that. "

"You can't, " said he, much too promptly. 

"Well, promise me one thing, Harvey dear, " she pleaded; "promise meyou'll take a month or two to think it over. We couldn't be marriedfor a year, in any event, so what's the sense of being in such a hurryto settle the matter definitely?"

Harvey reflected. He found himself in a very peculiar predicament. Hehad gone to her house with the avowed intention of offering her threethousand dollars and the studio in exchange for a half interest in thedrug store. Now his long cherished dream seemed to be turning into anightmare. 

"I will think it over, " he said, at last, in secret desperation. "Butcan't you give me a year's option?"

"On me?"

"On the store. "

"Well, am I not the store?"

"No ma'am, " said he, hastily. "I can't look at you in that light. Ican't think of you as a drug store. "

"I am sure I would make you a good and loving wife, Harvey. If Daviswere alive he could tell you how devoted I was to him in allthe----"

"But that's just the trouble, he isn't alive!" cried poor Harvey, athis wits' end. "Give me eight months. "

"In the meantime you will up and marry some one else. Half the girlsin town are crazy--no, I won't say that, " she made haste to interruptherself, suddenly realising the tactlessness of the remark. "Come upto dinner next Sunday and we will talk it over again. It is the bestdrug store in Blakeville, Harvey; remember that. "

"I will remember it, " he said, blankly, and took his departure. 

As he passed Simpson's book store he dashed in and bought a New Yorkdramatic paper. Hurriedly looking through the route list of companies, he found that the "Up in the Air" company was playing that week inPhiladelphia. Without consulting his attorney he telegraphed toNellie:--"Am in trouble. Uncle Peter is dead. Left me everything. Willyou come back? Harvey. "

The next day he had a wire from Nellie, charges collect:--"If he leftyou everything, why don't you pay for telegrams when you send them?Nellie. "

He replied:--"I was not sure you were with the company, that's why. Shall I come to Philadelphia? Harvey. "

Her answer:--"Not unless you are looking for more trouble. Nellie. "

His next:--"There's a woman here who wants me to marry her. Won't youhelp me? Harvey. "

Her last:--"There's a man here who is going to marry me. Why don't youmarry her? Naughty! Naughty! Nellie. "

He gave up in despair at this. On Sunday he allowed Mrs. Davis tobullyrag him into a tentative engagement. Then he began to droop. Hehad done a bit of investigating on his own account before going up todine with her. She had been married to Davis forty-two years and thenhe died. If their only daughter had lived she would be forty-one yearsof age, and, if married, would doubtless be the mother of a daughterwho might also in turn be the mother of a child. Figuring back, hemade out that under these circumstances Mrs. Davis might very easilyhave been a great-grandmother. With this appalling thought in mind, he was quite firm in his determination to reject the old lady'sproposal. Mrs. Davis taking Nellie's place! Pretty, gay, vivaciousNellie! It was too absurd for words. 

But he went home an engaged man, just the same. 

They were to be married in September of the following year, manymonths off. 

That afternoon he saw a few gray hairs just above his ears and pulledthem out. After that he looked for them every day. It was amazing howrapidly they increased despite his efforts to exterminate them. Hebegan to grow careless in the matter of dress. His much talked ofchecked suits and lavender waistcoats took on spots and creases; hisgaudy neckties became soiled and frayed; his fancy Newmarket overcoat, the like of which was only to be seen in Blakeville when sometravelling theatrical troupe came to town, looked seedy, unbrushed, and sadly wrinkled. He forgot to shave for days at a time. 

His only excuse to himself was, What's the use?

During the holidays, in the midst of a cheerful season of buyingpresents for Phoebe--and a bracelet for Nellie--he saw in the_Patriot_, under big headlines, the thing that served as the laststraw for his already sagging back. The announcement was being made inall the metropolitan newspapers that "Nellie Duluth, the most popularand the most beautiful of all the comic opera stars, " was to quit thestage forever on the first of the year to become the wife of "thegreat financier, L. Z. Fairfax, long a devoted admirer. "

The happy couple were to spend the honeymoon on the groom's yacht, sailing in February for an extended cruise of the Mediterranean andother "sunny waters of the globe, " primarily for pleasure but actuallyin the hope of restoring Miss Duluth to her normal state of health. Abreakdown, brought on no doubt by the publicity attending her divorcea few months earlier, made it absolutely imperative, said thenewspapers, for her to give up the arduous work of her chosenprofession. 

Harvey did not send the bracelet to her. 

 * * * * *

The long winter passed. Spring came and in its turn gave way tosummer. September drew on apace. He went about with an everincreasing tendency to look at the wall calendar with a fixed starewhen he should have been paying attention to the congratulations thatcame to him from the opposite side of the counter or showcase. Hisbaby-blue eyes wore the mournful, distressed look of an offending dog;his once trim little moustache drooped over the corners of his mouth;his shoulders sagged and his feet shuffled as he walked. 

"Harvey, " said Mrs. Davis, not more than a fortnight before thewedding day, "You look terribly peaked. You must perk up for thewedding. "

"I'm going into a decline, " he said, affecting a slight cough. 

"You are going to decline!" she shrilled, in her high, querulousvoice. 

"I said 'into, ' Minerva, " he explained, dully. 

"I do believe I'm getting a bit deaf, " she said, pronouncing it"deef. "

"It will be mighty tough on you if I should suddenly go into quickconsumption, " said he, somewhat hopefully. 

"You mustn't think of such a thing, dearie, " she protested. 

"No, " said he, letting his shoulders sag again. "I suppose it's nouse. "

Just a week to the day before the 6th of September--the one numeral onthe calendar he could see with his eyes closed--he shuffled over tothe tailor's to try on the new Prince Albert coat and striped trousersthat Mrs. Davis was giving him for a wedding present. He puffed weaklyat the cigarette that hung from his lips and stared at the windowwithout the slightest interest in what was going on outside. 

A new train of thought was taking shape in his brain, as yet ratherindefinite and undeveloped, but quite engaging as a matter forcontemplation. 

"Do you know how far it is to Reno?" he asked of the tailor, whopaused in the process of ripping off the collar of the new coat. 

"Couple of thousand miles, I guess. Why?"

"Oh, nothing, " said Harvey, blinking his eyes curiously. "I justasked. "

"You're not thinking of going out there, are you?"

"My health isn't what it ought to be, " said Harvey, staring westwardover the roof of the church down the street. "If I don't get better Imay have to go West. "

"Gee, is it as bad as all that?"

Harvey's lips parted to give utterance to a vigorous response, but hecaught himself up in time. 

"Maybe it won't amount to anything, " he said, noncommittally. "I'vegot a little cough, that's all. " He coughed obligingly, in the way ofillustration. 

"Don't wait too long, " advised the kindly tailor. "If you get after itin time it can be checked, they say, although I don't believe it. Inthe family?"

"Not yet, " said his customer, absently. "A week from to-day. " Areflection which puzzled the tailor vastly. 

Whatever may have been in Harvey's mind at the moment was swept awayforever by the sudden appearance in the shop door of Bobby Nixon, the"boy" at Davis'. 

"Say, Harvey, " bawled the lad, "come on, quick! Mrs. Davis is over atthe store and she's red-headed because you've been away for more'n anhour. She's got a telegram from some'eres and----"

"A telegram!" gasped Harvey, turning pale. "Who from?"

"How should I know?" shouted Bobby. "But she's got blood in her eye, you can bet on that. "

Harvey did not wait for the tailor to strip the skeleton of the PrinceAlbert from his back, but dashed out of the shop in wild haste. 

Mrs. Davis was behind the prescription counter. She had been weeping. At the sight of him she burst into fresh lamentations. 

"Oh, Harvey, I've got terrible news for you--just terrible! But Iwon't put up with it! I won't have it! It's abominable! She ought tobe tarred and feathered and----"

Harvey began to tremble. 

"Somebody's doing it for a joke, Mrs. Davis, " he gulped. "I swear togoodness I never had a thing to do with a woman in all my life. Nobody's got a claim on me, honest to----"

"What are you talking about, Harvey?" demanded Mrs. Davis, wide-eyed. 

"What does it say?" cried he, pulling himself up with a jerk. "I'minnocent, whatever it is. "

"It's from your wife, " said Mrs. Davis, shaking the envelope in hisface. "Read it! Read the awful thing!"

"From--from Nellie?" he gasped. 

"Yes, Eller! Read it!"

"Hold it still! I can't read it if you jiggle it around----"

She held the envelope under his nose. 

"Do you see who it's addressed to?" she grated out. "To me, as yourwife. She thinks I'm already married to you. Read that name there, Harvey. "

He read the name on the envelope in a sort of stupefaction. Then shewhisked the message out and handed it to him, plumping herself down ina chair to fan herself vigorously while the prescription clerkhastened to renew his ministrations with the ammonia bottle, a taskthat had been set to him some time prior to the advent of Harvey. 

Suddenly Harvey gave a squeal of joy and instituted a series of hopsand bounds that threatened to create havoc in the narrow, bottle-encircled space behind the prescription wall. He danced up anddown, waving the telegram on high, the tails of his half-finishedwedding garment doing a mad obbligato to the tune of his nimble legs. 

"Harvey!" shrieked Mrs. Davis, aghast. 

"Yi-i-i!" rang out his ear-splitting yell. Pedestrians half a blockaway heard it and felt sorry for Mrs. Wiggs, the unhappy wife of thetown sot, who, it went without saying, must be on another "toot. "

"Harvey!" cried the poor lady once more. 

"She's going to faint!" shouted the prescription clerk inconsternation. 

"Let her! Let her!" whooped Harvey. "It's all right, Joe! Let herfaint if she wants to. "

"I'm not going to faint!" exclaimed Mrs. Davis, struggling to her feetand pushing Joe away. "Keep quiet, Harvey! Do you want customers tothink you're crazy? Give me that telegram. I'll attend to that. I'llanswer it mighty quick, let me tell you. Give it to me. "

Harvey sobered almost instantly. His jaw fell. The look in her facetook all the joy out of his. 

"Isn't--isn't it great, Minerva?" he murmured, as he allowed her tosnatch the message from his unresisting fingers. 

She glared at him. "Great? Why, you don't think for a moment that I'llhave the brat in my house, do you? Great? I don't see what you can bethinking of, Harvey. You must be clean out of your head. I should sayit ain't great. It's perfectly outrageous. Where's the telegraphoffice, Joe? I'll show the dreadful little wretch that she can't shunther child off on me for support. Not much. Where is it, Joe? Didn'tyou hear what I asked?"

"Yes, ma'am, " acknowledged Joe, blankly. 

"You can't be mean enough--I should say you don't mean to tell her wewon't take Phoebe?" gasped Harvey, blinking rapidly. "Surely you can'tbe so hard-hearted as all----"

"That will do, Harvey, " said she, sternly. "Don't let me hear anotherword out of you. The idea! Just as soon as she thinks you're safelymarried to some one who can give that child a home she up and tries toget rid of her. The shameless thing! No, sir-ree! She can't shuffleher brat off on me. Not if I know what I'm----"

She fell back in alarm. The telegram fluttered to the floor. Harveywas standing in front of her, shaking his fist under her nose, hisface contorted by a spasm of fury. 

"Don't you call my little girl a brat, " he sputtered. "And don't youdare to call my wife a shameless thing!"

"Your wife!" she gasped. 

He waved his arms like a windmill. 

"My widow, if you are going to be so darned particular about it, " heshouted, inanely. "Don't you dare send a telegram saying Phoebe can'tcome and live with her father. I won't have it. She's coming just asfast as I can get her here. Hurray!"

Mrs. Davis lost all of her sternness. She dissolved into tears. 

"Oh, Harvey dear, do you really and truly want that child back again?"she sniffled. 

"Do I?" he barked. "My God, I should say I do! And say, I'd give mysoul if I could get Nellie back, too. How do you like that?"

The poor woman was ready to fall on her knees to him. 

"For Heaven's sake--for my sake--don't speak of such a thing. Don'ttry to get her back. Promise me! I'll let the child come, but--oh!don't take Nellie back. It would break my heart. I just couldn't haveher around, not if I tried my----"

Harvey stared, open-mouthed. "I didn't mean that I'd like to have youtake her back, Minerva. You haven't anything to do with it. "

She stiffened. "Well, if I haven't, I'd like to know who has. It's myhouse, isn't it?"

"Don't make a scene, Minerva, " he begged, suddenly aware of thepresence of a curious crowd in the front part of the store. "Go homeand I'll send the telegram. And say, if I were you, I'd go out theback way. "

"And just to think, it's only a week till the wedding day, " she chokedout. 

"We can put it off, " he made haste to say. 

"I know I shall positively hate that child, " said she, overlooking hisgenerous offer. "I will be a real stepmother to her, you mark mywords. You can let her come if you want to, Harvey, but you mustn'texpect me to treat her as anything but a--a--an orphan. " She was a bitmixed in her nouns. 

A brilliant idea struck him. 

"You'd better be nice to her, Mrs. Davis, if you know what's good foryou. Now, don't flare up! You mustn't forget you've broken the law byopening a telegram not intended for you. "

"What?"

"It isn't addressed to you, " he said, examining the envelope. "Yourname is still Mrs. Davis, isn't it?"

"Of course it is. "

"Well, then, what in thunder did you open a telegram addressed to mywife for? That's my wife's name, not yours. "

"But, " she began, vastly perplexed, "but it was meant for me. "

"How do you know?" he demanded. 

Her eyes bulged. "You--you don't mean that there is another one, Harvey?"

He winked with grave deliberateness. "That's for you to find out. "

He darted through the back door into the alley, just as she collapsedin the prescriptionist's arms. In the telegraph office he read andre-read the message, his eyes aglow. It was from Nellie and came fromNew York, dated Friday, the first. 

 "Am sending Phoebe to Blakeville next Monday to make her home with you and Harvey. Letter to-day explains all. Have Harvey meet her in Chicago Tuesday, four P. M. , Lake Shore. "

He scratched his chin reflectively. 

"I guess it don't call for an answer, after all, " he said as much tohimself as to the operator. 

Nellie's letter came the next afternoon, addressed to Harvey. In astate of great excitement he broke the seal and read the poignantmissive with eyes that were glazed with wonder and--something evenmore potent. 

She began by saying that she supposed he was happily married, andwished him all the luck in the world. Then she came abruptly to thepoint, as she always did:--"I am in such poor health that the doctorssay I shall have to go to Arizona at once. I am good for about sixmonths longer at the outside, they say. Not half that long if I stayin this climate. Maybe I'll get well if I go out there. I'm not verykeen about dying. I hate dead things; don't you? Now about Phoebe. She's been pining for you all these months. She doesn't like Mr. Fairfax, and he's not very strong for her. To be perfectly honest, hedoesn't want her about. She's not his, and he hasn't much use foranything or anybody that doesn't belong to him. I've got so that Ican't stand it, Harvey. The poor little kiddie is so miserablyunhappy, and I'm not strong enough to get out and work for her as Iused to. I would if I could. I think Fairfax is sick of the wholething. He didn't count on me going under as I have. He hasn't beennear me for a month, but he says it's because he hates the sight ofPhoebe. I wonder. It wasn't that way a couple of years ago. But I'mdifferent now. You wouldn't know me, I'm that thin and skinny. I hatethe word, but that's what I am. The doctors have ordered me to alittle place out in Arizona. I've got to do what they say, and whatFairfax says. It's the jumping-off place. So I'm leaving in a day ortwo with Rachel. My husband says he can't leave his business, but I'mnot such a fool as he thinks. I won't say anything more about him, except that he hasn't the courage to watch me go down by inches. 

"I can't leave Phoebe with him and I don't think it best to have herwith me. She ought to be spared all that. She's so young, Harvey. She'd never forget. You love her, and she adores you. I'm giving herback to you. Don't--oh, please don't, ever let her leave Blakeville!I wish I had never left it, much as I hate it. I remember your newwife as being a kind, simple-hearted woman. She will be good to mylittle girl, I know, because she is yours as well. If I could get myhealth back, I'd work my heart out trying to support her, but it's outof the question. I have nothing to give her, Harvey, and I simply willnot let Fairfax provide for her. Do you understand? Or are you asstupid and simple as you always were? And as tender-hearted?"

There was more, but Harvey's eyes were so full of tears he could notread. 

 * * * * *

He was waiting in the Lake Shore station when the train pulled in onTuesday. His legs were trembling like two reeds in the wind and histeeth chattered with the chill of a great excitement. Out of the blurthat obscured his vision bounded a small figure, almost toppling himover as it clutched his not too stable legs and shrieked somethingthat must have pleased him vastly, for he giggled and chortled likeone gone daft with joy. 

A soulless guard tapped him on the shoulder and gruffly ordered himto "get off to one side with the kid, " he was blocking the exit--andflooding it, he added after a peep at Harvey's streaming eyes. 

Rachel, tall and sardonic, stood patiently by until the little manrecovered from his ecstasies. 

"I thought you were staying with my--with Mrs. Fairfax, " he said, gazing at her in amazement. He was holding Phoebe in his arms, and shewas so heavy that his face was purple from the exertion. 

"You'd better put her down, " said Rachel, mildly. "She's not a babyany longer. " With that she proceeded to pull the child's skirts downover the unnecessarily exposed pink legs. Harvey was not loath to sether down, a bit abruptly if the truth must be told. "Mrs. Fairfax isstill in the drawing-room, sir. She doesn't want to get off until thecrowd has moved out. "

Harvey stared. "She's--on--the--train?"

"We change for the Santa Fe, which leaves this evening for the West. I'll go back to her now. The way is quite clear, I think. Good-bye, Phoebe. Be a good----"

[Illustration: Copyright, 1911, by Dodd, Mead & CompanyHe stopped, aghast, petrified]

"I'm going with you!" cried Harvey, breathlessly. "Take me to thecar. "

Rachel hesitated. "You will be surprised, sir, when you see her. She'svery frail, and----"

"Come on! Take me to my wife at once!"

"You forget, sir. She is not your wife any----"

"Oh, Lordy, Lordy!" fell dismally from his lips. 

"And you have a new wife, I hear. So, if I were you, I'd avoid a sceneif----"

But he was through the gate, dragging Phoebe after him. Rachel couldnot keep up with them. The eager little girl led him to the right carand he scurried up the steps, bursting into drawing-room B an instantlater. 

Nellie, wrapped in a thick garment, was lying back in the corner ofthe seat, her small, white face with its great dark eyes standing outwith ghastly clearness against the collar of the ulster that almostenveloped her head. 

He stopped, aghast, petrified. 

"Oh, Nellie!" he wailed. 

She betrayed no surprise. A wan smile transfigured her thin face. With an effort she extended a small gloved hand. He grasped it andfound there was so little of it that it seemed lost in his palm. Thesweat broke out on his forehead. He could not speak. This was Nellie!

Her voice was low and husky. 

"Good-bye, Harvey. Be good to Phoebe, old fellow. "

He choked up and could only nod his head. 

"We can get out now, Mrs. Fairfax, " said Rachel, appearing at thedoor. "Do you think you can walk, or shall I call for a----"

"Oh, I can walk, " said Nellie, with a touch of her old raillery. "I'mnot that far gone. Good-bye, Harvey. Didn't you hear me? Don't standthere watching me like that. It's bad enough without----"

He turned on Rachel furiously. 

"Where is that damned Fairfax? Why isn't he here with her? The dog!"

"Hush, Harvey!"

"He's mean to mamma, " broke in Phoebe, in her high treble. "I hatehim. And so does mamma. Don't you, mamma?"

"Phoebe! Be quiet!"

"Where is he?" repeated Harvey, shaking his finger in Rachel's face. 

"What are you blaming me for?" demanded the maid, indignantly. "Everybody blames me for everything. He's in New York, that's where heis. Now, you get out of here!"

She actually shoved him out into the aisle, where he stood tremblingand uncertain, while she assisted her mistress to her feet and led herhaltingly toward the exit. 

Nellie looked back over her shoulder at him, quite coquettishly. Sheshook her head at him in mild derision. 

"My, what a fire-eater my little Harvey has become, " she said. Hebarely heard the words. "Your new wife must be scared half out of herwits all the time. "

He sprang to her side, gently taking her arm in his hand. She lurchedtoward him ever so slightly. He felt the weight of her on his arm andmarvelled that she was so much lighter than Phoebe. 

"I'm not married, Nellie dear!" he cried. "It's not to be till Friday. You got the date wrong. And it won't be Friday, either. No, sir! I'mnot going to let you go all the way out there alone. I said I'd lookout for you when we were married, and I'm going to. You've got ahusband, but what good is he to you? He's a brute. Yes, sir; I'm goingwith you and I don't give a cuss who knows it. See here! See this wadof bills? Well, by jingo, there's more than three thousand dollarsthere. I drew it out this morning to give to you if you were hard up. I----"

"Oh, Harvey, what a perfect fool you are!" she cried, tears in hereyes. "You always were a fool. Now you are a bigger one than ever. Goaway, please! I can get along all right. Fairfax is paying foreverything. Put that roll away! Do you want to be held up right herein the station?"

"And I've still got the photograph gallery, " he went on. "It's rentedand I get $40 a month out of it. I'll take care of you, Nellie. I'llsee you safely out there. Then maybe I'll have to come back and marryold Mrs. Davis, God help me! I hate to think of it, but she's got hermind set on it. I don't believe I can get out of it. But she'll haveto postpone it, I can tell you that, whether she likes it or not. Maybe she'll call it off when she hears I've eloped with anotherman's wife. She thinks I'm a perfect scamp with women, anyway, andthis may turn her dead against me. Gee, I hope it does! Say, let me goalong with you, Nellie; please do. You and I won't call it anelopement, but maybe she will and that would save me. And that beastof a Fairfax won't care, so what's the harm?"

"No, " said Nellie, looking at him queerly. "Fairfax won't care. Youcan be sure of that. "

"Then I'm with you, Nellie!" he shouted. 

"You are a perfectly dreadful fool, Harvey, " she said, huskily. 

"I know it!" he exclaimed. 

GROSSET & DUNLAP'SDRAMATIZED NOVELS

Original, sincere and courageous--often amusing--the kind that are makingtheatrical history. 

MADAME X. By Alexandra Bisson and J. W. McConaughy. Illustrated withscenes from the play. 

A beautiful Parisienne became an outcast because her husband would notforgive an error of her youth. Her love for her son is the great finalinfluence in her career. A tremendous dramatic success. 

THE GARDEN OF ALLAH. By Robert Hichens. 

An unconventional English woman and an inscrutable stranger meet and lovein an oasis of the Sahara. Staged this season with magnificent cast andgorgeous properties. 

THE PRINCE OF INDIA. By Lew. Wallace. 

A glowing romance of the Byzantine Empire, presenting with extraordinarypower the siege of Constantinople, and lighting its tragedy with the warmunderglow of an Oriental romance. As a play it is a great dramaticspectacle. 

TESS OF THE STORM COUNTRY. By Grace Miller White. Illust. By HowardChandler Christy. 

A girl from the dregs of society, loves a young Cornell Universitystudent, and it works startling changes in her life and the lives ofthose about her. The dramatic version is one of the sensations of theseason. 

YOUNG WALLINGFORD. By George Randolph Chester. Illust. By F. R. Grugerand Henry Raleigh. 

A series of clever swindles conducted by a cheerful young man, each ofwhich is just on the safe side of a State's prison offence. As"Get-Rich-Quick Wallingford, " it is probably the most amusing expose ofmoney manipulation ever seen on the stage. 

THE INTRUSION OF JIMMY. By P. G. Wodehouse. Illustrations by Will Grefe. 

Social and club life in London and New York, an amateur burglaryadventure and a love story. Dramatized under the title of "A Gentlemanof Leisure, " it furnishes hours of laughter to the play-goers. 

Grosset & Dunlap, 526 West 26th St. , New York

CHARMING BOOKS FOR GIRLS

May be had wherever books are sold. Ask for Grosset & Dunlap's list

WHEN PATTY WENT TO COLLEGE, By Jean Webster. 

Illustrated by C. D. Williams. 

One of the best stories of life in a girl's college that has ever beenwritten. It is bright, whimsical and entertaining, lifelike, laughableand thoroughly human. 

JUST PATTY, By Jean Webster. 

Illustrated by C. M. Relyea. 

Patty is full of the joy of living, fun-loving, given to ingeniousmischief for its own sake, with a disregard for pretty convention whichis an unfailing source of joy to her fellows. 

THE POOR LITTLE RICH GIRL, By Eleanor Gates. 

With four full page illustrations. 

This story relates the experience of one of those unfortunate childrenwhose early days are passed in the companionship of a governess, seldomseeing either parent, and famishing for natural love and tenderness. Acharming play as dramatized by the author. 

REBECCA OF SUNNYBROOK FARM, By Kate Douglas Wiggin. 

One of the most beautiful studies of childhood--Rebecca's artistic, unusual and quaintly charming qualities stand out midst a circle ofaustere New Englanders. The stage version is making a phenomenal dramaticrecord. 

NEW CHRONICLES OF REBECCA, By Kate Douglas Wiggin. 

Illustrated by F. C. Yohn. 

Additional episodes in the girlhood of this delightful heroine that carryRebecca through various stages to her eighteenth birthday. 

REBECCA MARY, By Annie Hamilton Donnell

Illustrated by Elizabeth Shippen Green. 

This author possesses the rare gift of portraying all the grotesquelittle joys and sorrows and scruples of this very small girl with apathos that is peculiarly genuine and appealing. 

EMMY LOU: Her Book and Heart, By George Madden Martin. 

Illustrated by Charles Louis Hinton. 

Emmy Lou is irresistibly lovable, because she is so absolutely real. Sheis just a bewitchingly innocent, huggable little maid. The book iswonderfully human. 

Ask for complete free list of G. & D. Popular Copyrighted Fiction

Grosset & Dunlap, 526 West 26th St. New York