Ainslee's Magazine/Volume 20/Number 5/The Branding of the Maverick

by Ralph Henry Barbour

 

THE BRANDING
OF THE
MAVERICK

By
Ralph Henry Barbour

I SUPPOSE,” thought Jack Crosby, “that the geographical center of the Sahara Desert on the Fourth of July would be some quiet, but darned if New York at Christmas time hasn't got it thrown and hog-tied for genuine loneliness! It sure has!”

He flattened himself out against the front of the building, as the throng at the entrance grew momentarily larger, and lighted a cigarette. He was a good-looking chap; broad-shouldered and broad-hipped; straight-backed, with a well-shaped head set easily on a rather short neck. His face was tanned by wind and weather to an even tone of brown, through which the warm blood, summoned by the unaccustomed moisture of the cold air, showed with healthy ardor. His brown hair was a bit wavy, the nose was short, straight, somewhat impertinent in a good-humored way, and the closely trimmed mustache, bleached to a lighter shade than his hair by the hot Western sun, likewise suggested a certain effrontery, which, perhaps, should have been, but was not, unpleasant. His eyes, level and calm, were softly gray, at first glance startlingly, incongruously light when seen in contrast with the tan of his face. Usually each of those quiet eyes held an amused twinkle in its depths, as though some time during the twenty-seven years in which they had looked upon the world they had discovered a most excellent joke, a joke which never grew stale and which was all the finer for being secret.

At the present moment, however, which, to be exact, was twelve minutes after three on the twenty-fourth day of December, the eyes had a troubled expression, and there was a slight pucker between the brows. Jack was feeling sadly out of place; not only out of place but out of—well, things generally, out of everything.

Behind him rose the white marble façade of the big jewelry store, its mammoth windows agleam with gold and silver and gems so stupendously magnificent as to awe even the recklessness of the most lavish city in the world. In front of him the broad sidewalk was thronged with eager, hurrying, jostling humanity, for the most part well-dressed—even, from Jack Crosby's point of view, over-dressed—prosperous and contented.

Doubtless there were plenty of worried faces in those passing streams, but they were so outnumbered by the merry, radiant ones that they passed unnoted by Jack. To him it seemed that all New York was happily intent on the purchase of Christmas presents, that every one was going to give to every one else, and that, in short, out of all those millions about him, he alone was the only one with no interest in the place, the people, or the spirit of the occasion, the only one to whom the season meant well-nigh nothing.

He dropped a gloved hand into a pocket of his gray coat and felt ruefully of the tiny oblong package resting there, a scarf-pin for Wallace, the only present he had purchased. Had he had any one to give them to he would have liked to go back into the store and buy gifts right and left, for it was no sense of poverty that depressed him. On the contrary he had brought something approaching two thousand dollars with him from the ranch, with the cheerful intention of spending every red cent of it before he returned. So far, during two days, he had managed to get rid of about eighty dollars. It was terribly discouraging. For months, out there in Colorado, he had thought gleefully of the fun he was going to have spending that money. He had talked it over with Wallace dozens of times, and had even made a list inches long of things he would bring back with him. But since reaching New York the savor had vanished. The things on the list didn't appeal to him a bit.

It was his first trip East in six years, the first since he had left college and Wallace and he had taken over the Bar-J-Cup Ranch. And now, after those six years of hard work, when he had plenty of money to spend, there was not a soul to spend it on! He had thrown tips about him lavishly at the big hotel farther uptown, and this afternoon he had practically emptied his pockets of every bit of loose change under the blandishments of beggars and newsboys.

But that didn't satisfy him. He wanted to buy things and give them to folks; he wanted the glow inside that comes of that sort of thing; he wanted—hang it! He wanted to belong to the bunch and not be a darned old maverick such as he felt himself to be!

“Any old body,” he said to himself, “can put their brand on me that wants to. What I want is to get in with the herd.”

The avenue was joyously noisy with the clatter of hoofs, the jangle of harness, the purr of motor vehicles, and the cries of porters. There was an unending stream of carriages pausing to empty their furred and flowered occupants in front of the big jewelry establishment, and moving on again to take up positions in the long file around the corner.

For a while Jack had watched the scene with interest, and more than one pair of soft eyes had glanced provocatively into his as their owners passed by through the big portal. There had been a time when one such glance would have set his heart thumping and his feet following. But that had been more than six years ago, what time he wore a frat pin on his coat and was, to use his own expression, just aching for trouble. To-day the glances at first amused, then annoyed him. He moved farther away from the entrance.

“They'll think I'm a damned masher,” he thought. “Why couldn't Wallace have settled on some other place to meet me, anyhow?”

He wished he hadn't agreed to wait for his friend there; he even began to regret having come East with him at all. It was all well enough for Wal, he thought. He had come to see his girl and, if she could be persuaded to agree, to marry her out of hand in January. It didn't make any difference to Wal whether it was Christmas time or whether there were three million people around him who didn't know him or want to know him. He had the girl. Fellows in love were a selfish lot, Jack decided.

He glanced at his watch. It was already a quarter past the hour. He had a good mind to go back to the hotel; it was scarcely likely that Wallace and Miss Ferrol were going to keep the appointment. Still, he would give them five minutes longer; engaged persons were locoed, anyway. He dropped his watch back into his pocket, buttoned his well-fitting gray coat, and fixed his regard again patiently on the vibrating throng.

It was a gray day, a day when the white steam-clouds hung seemingly motionless above the buildings and the leaden sky threatened each moment to empty its snow coffers. In fact, flakes had fluttered once or twice already, and the air was heavy with promise of more. It was a day that, as Jack told himself resentfully, simply smelled of Christmas!

Suddenly he became aware that he had a neighbor. Beside him, two or three paces nearer the entrance, stood a person who, like Jack, had stepped aside out of the throng, perhaps to await a friend, perhaps to merely watch the ever-changing picture. He was tall, strikingly good-looking, immaculately attired in afternoon dress. Everything about him, from his speckless spats to the white gardenia in the lapel of his frock coat, was absolutely flawless.

Jack studied him with growing disfavor. He had been long enough in the West to acquire the Westerner's suspicion of immaculateness in male attire.

“If he was out there,” thought Jack, “I'd put him down for a swell gambler. As it is, I guess he's a gentleman. I surely do wish, though, I could show him to Mac.”

He smiled gleefully at the thought of the ranch foreman's profane appreciation of his neighbor. Then he frowned.

“That's the seventh or eighth time he's bowed in the last two minutes,” he said to himself. “I don't believe he really knows all the folks he's bowing to.”

As though resenting the unuttered aspersion, the stranger turned and viewed Jack curiously and a trifle superciliously.

“Huh!” grunted Jack under his breath, returning the other's glance with frank antipathy. “Any one can take off his hat. I can do it myself, even though I don't know six persons in the city. And,” he added, partly from a natural love of mischief and partly because of a desire to irritate his neighbor, “I'll do it, too, as often as you do.”

As though to test that resolve the immaculate neighbor leaned slightly forward from his hips, removed his high hat, and bowed with elegant empressement. Off came Jack's derby. The occupants of a passing carriage smiled and nodded to the two men, but Jack caught the puzzled glances directed at him the next moment.

His neighbor turned and viewed him speculatively. Jack returned the look with one of easy effrontery. The stranger removed his eyes with a well-bred lack of expression on his face. Jack grinned. He was beginning to enjoy himself for the first time that afternoon.

After a moment the stranger's hat was again raised and Jack's went with it. This time there was evident annoyance in the glance which the gentleman with the white gardenia shot at his tormentor. Whether he realized that the rather breezy-looking man beside him was deliberately mocking him I can't say. Nor did Jack ever discover, either, for at that instant the high hat made another excursion outward and upward and the neighboring derby was scarcely a half-second behind. And at the end of that second Jack discovered with a shock that he was holding his hat in air and smiling inanely into a pair of surprised blue eyes.

A hansom had drawn up at the curb in front of the entrance, and within it, in the act of stretching a dainty foot toward the sill, was a vision of loveliness that sent the blood surging from Jack's heart into every far corner of his body in a grand, ecstatic, bewildering thrill. And all the time, a mere fragment of a second, possibly, but to him a very long moment indeed, his eyes held hers.

At first the girl's face expressed surprise, then conjecture, and then—wonder of wonders!—recognition. The mouth curved in a smile and the brown head bent graciously.

For a moment Jack doubted the evidence of his senses. It was a tribute to his discernment that whereas he had accepted unquestioningly the glances bestowed upon him previously that afternoon, now he was ready to admit any supposition save the one that that blue-eyed, brown-haired goddess had deliberately returned his salutation. She was not that sort, he told himself, not by a blamed sight! Probably she had bowed to some one behind him. Impossible, since his back was against the window.

Then—why, of course! She had intended that gracious recognition for his foppish neighbor. And yet, as he offered the explanation, he discredited it. And to prove the theory untenable the girl removed her gaze from Jack to his neighbor and bowed a second time, only—dared he think it?—with more reserve.

What I have taken so long to describe happened in a very small space of time. The black, silken ankle still rested on the edge of the hansom floor and a gray-gloved hand sought the top of the dashboard.

With the disconcerting knowledge that the color was piling up into his face, and the equally disconcerting knowledge that he hadn't felt so nearly scared to death in many years, Jack thrust his hat back into place and pushed his way through the throng toward the hansom.

At the same instant the immaculate stranger did the same thing. But Jack had the advantage of being a yard nearer. Muttering something, what he scarcely knew, he held out his hand. The gray glove rested on it for an instant, he had a fleeting vision of two serene blue eyes smiling kindly upon him, and then she was beside him on the sidewalk, tall, well-gowned in a smooth, steel-gray cloth, and the winter air was suddenly redolent of violets.

“Thank you,” she said softly. And then, in a lower tone, and somewhat hurriedly: “Will you go to the door with me?”

The immaculate stranger had paused a step or two away, visibly chagrined, and as Jack followed the girl to the wide portal of the shop he turned on his heel and followed them with an angry glare in his dark eyes.

Inside the door, and out of the path of the pushing stream of shoppers, the girl turned, shot a quick glance through the glass, and, with a charming impulsiveness, held out her hand. Jack grabbed it. I use the word grabbed advisedly. It is not an elegant word, but it comes nearer than any other to describing the manner in which he accepted the hand-clasp.

“Thank you so much,” she said.

“Not at all,” responded Jack eagerly.

Then with a little nod, a little smile, and a final whiff of violets from the bunch at her breast she was gone.

Jack came to himself a moment later with his back against a show-case and an elderly lady with a wealth of white aigrettes in her bonnet striving angrily to free her gown from his sacrilegious feet.

Once more outside he paused indecisively. What was to be done next? For that the adventure should end there was simply out of the question. He looked about for the hansom. Naturally, it had gone. He remembered that the carriage porter had handed the girl a check. That could only mean that the hansom was to return for her. He wished he had taken notice of the driver or the number of the vehicle. In that case he could have found them around the corner and learned something, possibly, to his advantage.

He looked about for his neighbor with the white gardenia, but he, too, had taken his departure. Plainly the only course to pursue was take up his position at the door again and await the girl's reappearance.

He moved back to his place by the window, lighted a cigarette, and prepared to wait. It dawned upon him just at that moment that New York was a most picturesque, a most interesting city, that it was a beautiful afternoon, and that in some wonderful manner during the last few minutes Fifth Avenue had become fragrant with the heady perfume of violets.

He beamed upon the world. He was glad it was Christmas time. Christmas was a beautiful occasion! He would have liked to go inside and buy stick-pins, rings, fobs, and all sorts of trinkets and then stand here on the sidewalk and distribute them to the passers with a jovial “Merry Christmas!” to each. Oh, he could have committed any mad escapade imaginable with a good heart!

One cigarette burned out and another took its place. He kept his eyes on the doorway, and the minutes passed. A quarter of an hour; twenty minutes; twenty-five minutes—a horrible thought assailed him. Supposing she had left by the side entrance! With a groan he fought his way to the corner. Thank Heaven! There was no side entrance.

With a sigh of relief he hurried back to his post, searching the edge of the sidewalk lest his quarry should have emerged during his moment of absence. Carriages rolled up and rolled away, but the girl in gray came not. Four o'clock struck from a neighboring spire. He began to lose hope.

And then, just when his spirits were at their lowest ebb, the miracle happened!

She was out on the sidewalk and had given her check to the porter before Jack realized what was happening. Then for another moment—a moment of indecision, of alternate flushes of temerity and waves of panic—he remained rooted to the iron grating on which he stood. Then, as the girl, glancing here and there as though seeking some one, moved toward the curb, Jack, with the courage of despair, hurried after her.

But when she turned and saw him beside her, hat in hand, at once apologetic and audacious, he found that he could think of nothing to say. For a moment they looked at each other. Then the girl's eyes dropped a trifle affrightedly, and Jack, with a sudden pounding at his heart, found his voice.

“You've been shopping?” he asked unnecessarily, his eyes flitting to the white-paper bundles in her arm.

“Yes, there is always something at the last moment, isn't there?” she replied a trifle nervously. “I am waiting”—She broke off to look toward the corner. “I've got a hansom somewhere.”

“Let me find it!” he exclaimed, his voice eloquent of a passionate desire to perform some service for her. For an instant a chaotic vision of himself rushing into the press of vehicles around the corner and literally pulling her particular hansom out by the roots warmed his heart. But she was shaking her head and smiling deprecatingly.

“It will be here in a moment, I think,” she said.

Good Lord! So it would be! Jack's heart sank; and as a moment before it had been floating blissfully about in empyrean heights, the fall was stupendous and almost took his breath away. When that hansom came it would be all over, everything; New York would be the dirty old hole it really was, and he would again be merely the utter outsider, of interest to none save the hotel servants—and to them only while his money lasted.

And even while he contemplated the dire crisis it came and found him unprepared. The hansom rattled up.

It was necessary for Jack to step a little aside before the girl could enter, and as he stood immovable she smiled apologetically and made a little inclination as though to pass him. Reluctantly he gave way and held out his hand. Hers settled upon it, there was a wildly intoxicating breath of Princess violets in his nostrils, and then she was in the hansom, pressing her skirts about her and laying the tiny bundles at her side. Jack held out his hand. With the faintest flush in her cheeks the girl placed hers in it. Jack clung to it hard.

“It was awfully good of you to remember me,” he stammered. “I wish—I wish you'd tell me where——”

“Not at all,” she answered politely, hurriedly. “Tell him Jenkins', please, and ask him to drive quickly.”

“But—but that's not your home.”

“Why, no, it's a bookstore,” she answered wonderingly. “Good afternoon, and thank you so much.” She nodded and smiled. It was plainly a dismissal.

Even Jack's courage wavered. He dropped her hand and spoke up into the red, moonlike countenance-inclining over the edge of the hansom roof. There was just time for a last glance at the girl's face as the carriage moved away. Her eyes held his all during that fleeting moment, and in them Jack thought he read a question, a question that was an echo of his own.

Then paradise was blotted out and he was staring unseeingly at the shop across the avenue. The hansom was lost in the northbound traffic. Jack's thoughts during the next two minutes were about as follows:

“It's all over! Oh, damn! I'll never see her again! I was a fool to let her go! I haven't got the spunk of a greaser! But it's too late now, too late—Jenkins'!”'

The next moment he was running madly across the avenue in pursuit of an empty hansom.

“Hi!” he called. Cabby never turned.

“Hi, hansom!” The hansom rolled on.

Then Jack forgot that he was in civilization, or his necessity was so great that he didn't care. He raised his voice and expanded an excellent pair of lungs in a shrill, ear-piercing yell that on the range could be heard a clean two miles on a still day.

“Ye-o-o-ow!” remarked Jack.

It nearly caused a panic on the avenue. Traffic stopped all up and down the block. But he caught his hansom.

“Jenkins',” he called as he leaped into it. “And drive like the devil. There's five dollars in it!”

“All right, sir, I'll get you there in five minutes, sir. Where is it?”

“Why, you—you left-handed, bandy-legged imitation of a horned toad!” said Jack. “Don't you know Jenkins'?”

“You mean the bookstore?” asked cabby apologetically.

“I sure do! And if you don't get me there before presently I'll be all over you, son. Hike!”

Cabby hiked. Jack smoked a cigarette feverishly. Then came Jenkins'. Cabby tucked a five-dollar bill into his pocket.

“Shall I wait, sir?” he asked.

“No!” shouted Jack.

Then he plunged for the door and collided with a bunch of Princess violets. He drew back, stammering apologies. The girl shot a startled glance at him, smiled, grew suddenly sober again, bowed with face bent away from him, and passed out. Jack followed.

“Wait, please!” he begged.

She paused and turned toward him gravely. “Do you think you are behaving well?” she asked.

“But an old acquaintance——” he began boldly.

“I never saw you before to-day,” she answered coldly. But there was just the faintest suspicion of a tremble at the corners of her mouth.

“And you never will again if you're not kinder. Oh, I know you don't care,” he went on hurriedly, pleadingly. “But it would make a whole lot of difference to me. Is that your hansom? May I put you in?”

She turned and crossed the sidewalk. Silence is supposed to give assent. When she was inside he turned to the driver.

“Up to the park entrance,” he directed. “And drive slowly.”

Then he entered the hansom.

The girl viewed him with something that was a strange mixture of anger, alarm, and amusement.

“Please don't say anything until I've had a chance to explain,” begged Jack. “I know I've been terribly impolite and all that, but——”

“What direction did you give the driver?” she asked icily.

“Park entrance. I need that far to square myself,” answered Jack uneasily. “I'll get out there, honest to goodness! Look here, I'm quite respectable, really—even if it doesn't look that way. Please consider my position——”

“How about mine?” she asked quietly. Jack hesitated. “Maybe you're right,” he muttered. He thrust his cane at the trap. “Stop here,” he said. The hansom sidled over toward the curb.

The girl shot a quick glance at him. He was gazing ahead, with a frown on his forehead, and the way in which he was biting his mustache spoke volumes. Unseen, the girl smiled. The cab stopped. He turned gravely.

“I beg your pardon,” he said. “I'm really awfully sorry. I——”

“If I was sure of that——” she murmured. Jack's heart leaped. He thrust his head over the roof.

“Go ahead, you idiot! Park entrance!”

“But I haven't——” said she began.

“Don't spoil it,” he begged. “You're a perfect”—he swallowed—“awfully good to me. I don't want you to think me a cad. But what could I do? I don't know your name, nor where you live, nor anything; do I? Don't you see that I had to—to make the most of my chance?”

“Is it necessary that you should know—those things?” she asked carelessly.

“Is it necessary! Well, it certainly is! It's just about the most necessary thing ever! Why, I might never have seen you again?”

The girl's lips trembled. Then she was laughing frankly across at him.

“You're perfectly absurd,” she said.

“Me? Oh, I'm clean locoed,” answered Jack cheerfully.

“What's that mean?” she asked, striving to look serious again and only succeeding in looking demurely amused.

“Plumb crazy. I suppose it's slang. We're a slangy lot out West, you see.”

“Oh, so you're a Westerner!” she exclaimed, viewing him with evident interest. “That—that rather explains things, doesn't it?”

“I suppose it does,” he replied with a laugh. “We're a plain-sailing lot out there and when we want a thing——” He stammered and hesitated.

“You take it,” she finished. “I can quite believe it.”

“Well, we don't mind the fences! Then, look here,” he said anxiously, “you're going to forgive me, aren't you? If you only knew how out of it all I was to-day and what a difference meeting you has made! And there's something I ought to explain. I didn't see you when I bowed. The fact is I was just amusing myself. There was a chap there, all smeared up with bright clothes, and he kept bowing to people every minute, and he made me tired. I don't know a soul in this little town—except my partner and his girl—and so I was feeling pretty fairly out of it, you know. So I just thought I'd have some fun with that fashion-plate Johnnie. And—and whenever he bowed I bowed. And, then, the first thing I knew, you——”

“How jolly!” she laughed. “Wasn't he awfully mad?”

“Quien sabe?” answered Jack. “I don't believe he noticed that——” He stopped abruptly, the color flooding his face. “I beg your pardon,” he cried earnestly. “I clean forgot he was a friend of yours.”

“It's of no consequence,” she said, adding, as she turned her face away from him: “Besides, how could you know—but what I just—bowed—without knowing him—as I did to you?”

“Nonsense!” he said stoutly.

“It seems to me,” she went on with a little, embarrassed laugh, “that I owe an explanation myself. What did you think when I returned your bow?”

Jack considered a moment.

“I didn't know what to think,” he said at last. “But I was darn—I mean I was mighty sure you had a good reason.”

The earnest loyalty in his tones brought a sparkle to her eyes; but Jack couldn't see it.

“I must tell you,” she said. “He is not—a very particular friend of mine, and I didn't want to meet him, He learned that I was going there and waited for me. When I saw him I was going to tell the driver to go on, but just then I saw you bow and you looked—looked like a gentleman—and I thought I'd make believe I knew you and maybe you'd think you knew me and would help me out. You see, he is terribly jealous and——”

“Jealous!” growled Jack. “Do you mean that—that—I beg your pardon, I'm sure; I have no right——”

“But I don't mind,” she said soberly. “I was engaged to him once and—it was broken off, and he—he bothers me.”

“If you'd only given me the wink,” said Jack softly and longingly, “he wouldn't have bothered you a second. Why, say, I didn't like him the minute I set eyes on him; honest, I didn't! Now that was sort of funny, wasn't it? Intuition, don't you suppose?”

She laughed. He liked to hear her laugh. It made him all sort of warm and happy inside.

“I'm afraid your method wouldn't do for New York,” she said demurely. “But it was awfully nice of you to understand and help me out.”

“I didn't understand,” said Jack. “I just saw you and wanted to get to you. But I'm glad I did the right thing. And if that coyote ever bothers you again——”

“Thanks,” she answered quite soberly. “But I think to-day's episode will discourage him for a while. Why, look where we are! We're in the park!”

Jack thrust up the trap.

“Didn't I tell you the park entrance?” he demanded savagely.

“You didn't say which entrance, sir,” answered the driver innocently.

Jack beamed upon him. “That's so. Turn around and go back to Fifty-ninth Street. It was my fault, you see,” he said to the girl. “I ought to have said——”

But she was laughing at him. Jack smiled back.

“He's all right, that driver,” he said with conviction. “He's the first person with any horse-sense I've met since I drifted in here.”

“Thank you,” she said.

“Oh, I say, now! You know what I meant.”

“I'll pardon you. And now I think I'll ask you to have him take me home, if you think you've had opportunity to explain?”

“I suppose I have,” he answered ruefully, “but I don't know how much good my explaining has done,” He looked at her earnestly.

“I think we've both acted foolishly and—wrongly,” she said after a moment. “Supposing we cry quits?”

“Take you!” said Jack. “Where shall I tell him to go?”

She gave the address, and Jack shouted it to the driver.

“Can I put you down anywhere?” she asked.

“Oh, I'll get out at the entrance. My hotel isn't far, thank you. And—I suppose it's good-by now?” he asked mournfully.

“Don't you think it is time?” she said smilingly.

“I—I don't suppose you'll let me see you again?”

She shook her head.

“How could I?” she asked gently.

“Oh, I suppose not,” he grumbled. “If we were only out West—— I don't suppose you know any one here that I know?”

“Perhaps. Who do you know?”

“That's the trouble. Aside from the porters and bell-boys at the hotel I don't know a soul except Wallace and the girl he's going to marry.”

“Wallace who?” she asked quickly.

“Wallace Merrill. He's my partner, and he and I——”

But the girl was laughing enjoyably. Jack grinned responsively.

“I suppose you don't know him, do you?” he asked.

She shook her head, still struggling with her mirth. Her eyes sparkled with all sorts of lights. Jack began to feel dizzy. Those blue eyes and the odor of the violets were going to his head.

“I—I know who you are!” cried the girl.

“Do you?” asked Jack, beaming. “Honest injun?”

“Honest injun! You're John Crosby!”

“That's me! How'd you know? That's fine, isn't it? When may I call? I don't want to seem pressing, you understand, but——”

“You're going to be the best man at the wedding, aren't you?”

“So Wal says, but how did you know?”

“I heard. I'm to be bridesmaid.”

“The deuce you are! Wait! I've got it! You're—you're Miss Clifton! You are, aren't you?”

The girl nodded.

“And your front name—oh, what was it?”

“Ruth,” she said, “but I don't see that that matters.”

“Oh, doesn't it?' he said. “It matters a lot! Mine's Jack.”

“Is it?” she asked, dropping her eyes before his.

“Yes, do you like it?” he asked anxiously. “Rather a fool name I think.”

“I should think it would do very well,” she answered.

Jack sighed with relief.

“Talk about Providence and coincidences and all that!” he said wonderingly. “If this doesn't beat everything!” He laughed happily. “Tell me,” he asked, “what kind of violets are those?”

“I think they're called Princess,” she answered, lifting their drooping blossoms.

“Can you—can I get them most anywhere?” he asked anxiously.

“I think so,' she replied, a smile trembling about her lips.

“Good! They're awfully sweet, aren't they? We don't have them out our way,” he added regretfully. “I wonder if you'd miss them very much?”

She turned a startled glance toward him and Jack felt the color rushing into his face.

“Please don't think me a bally idiot,” he begged. “I won't open my mouth again, honest! What's she stopping here for?”

“This is where I live,” she answered.

“By Jove, is it?” asked Jack, viewing the brown stone front with wondering eyes. “Think of that! Why, it looks like any other house. I beg pardon.” And he leaped to the sidewalk to help her out. She opened her purse, but he remonstrated.

“Please let me attend to him, Miss Clifton. You see, it's been my drive, hasn't it?”

But she demurred.

“Then we'll split it,” said Jack. “I'll settle and collect your share when I see you again. By the way,” he added as she took his hand and stepped out, “to-morrow's Christmas. Don't you think that as a sort of Christmas present you might let me call in the afternoon?”

“Do you really want to?” she asked, smiling into his eyes.

“Do you doubt it?” he asked softly.

“I'm not sure,” she answered. “Westerners are so—impetuous!”

“Not I,” he said stoutly. “I'm a bit cautious myself.”

He followed her up the steps and rang the bell.

“Would you mind letting me have one of those violets,” he asked, “as a sample? I think I'd like to buy some.”

“Oh, if you ask for Princess you're sure to get them.”

“I don't know about that,” he objected. “You can't tell what'll happen to you in this town.”

“Well——”

She drew half a dozen of the half-wilted blossoms from the bunch and held them out to him. Unfortunately—or fortunately, as you like—she raised her eyes to Jack's face as she stretched the blossoms forth to him. And the next instant he had violets and little gray-gloved hand and all at his lips.

“Oh!” she cried breathlessly. “What are you doing?”

“Darned if I know!” said Jack joyously. And with six sadly crushed violets in one hand and his hat in the other he leaped down the steps and into the hansom.

“Drive to a florist's!” he shouted.