Smith's Magazine/'On East'

It was customary in Mud Springs, which is a trading center of more or less importance in a mineralized section of Idaho, to speak of the spot where Herman Luckenbach had chosen to locate as a place that the Almighty could not find with a spyglass; and there was little exaggeration in the description, for it was quite impossible to see either Mr. Luckenbach or his log cabin until one was on top of them.

The sand bar where he washed out days' wages with his old-fashioned Long Tom rocker was on a tributary of the Snake River which flowed at the base of a mountain so steep that, while it was a matter of three hours' steady traveling to reach the top by the trail, a misstep at the summit would have enabled one to arrive at the bottom in as many seconds. Naturally, Mr. Luckenbach was not pestered with company, and almost his only visitor was “Snowshoe” Brown, who worked a placer a few miles farther down the river.

His reason for choosing this occupation, with its accompanying isolation, was his own secret, and he had not divulged it, but certain it is that, with the possible exception of a prize fighter, the last person in the world he resembled, either in tastes or appearance, was a placer miner. He looked like an old-fashioned schoolmaster, a professor of dead languages in a fresh-water college, the custodian of a library for scientific research—anything but what he was.

His figure had all the portliness of a framework of lathes dressed in narrow black trousers, a seersucker coat, and a straw hat with an infinitesimal brim and a crown gone to a peak through frequent wettings. Long hours of reflection had stooped his shoulders, and he went about his work with the abstracted stare of the thinker.

At the moment when this story opens, he was absent-mindedly engaged in squeezing water from a blue flannel shirt, which he then put into a wash boiler made from a five-gallon kerosene can with the side cut out. He prodded the shirt under the steaming water with the broom handle; after which he emptied the tub, hung the washboard in the shade, and sat down in the doorway of his cabin to cool off and continue his meditations.

His thoughts were pleasant, but remote, for he was thinking what a privilege it would have been to have lived in the days of Aristotle; to have walked, perhaps, with Plato among the groves and fountains of his renowned academy; to have known Athens. He dreamed until a shadow fell across the dooryard and the fresh and raucous voice of Snowshoe Brown called genially:

“Hullo, old sourdough!”

“How do you do, Brown?” Mr. Luckenbach responded stiffly.

“I brought you two months' gatherin' of mail, mostly catalogues. Them catalogues has broke many a mail contractor. What with puttin' on extry horses, wallerin' through eight feet of snow, riskin' freezin', and then gittin' docked for not bringin' 'em through on schedule, I wonder they git anybody to take it.”

Mr. Luckenbach was eagerly removing the wrapper from a book and did not answer. His eyes were bright with anticipation as he read the title, “Men and Days of Ancient Greece.” He quite forgot his visitor in skimming through it until that person called sharply:

“Say, old-timer, your soup's a-bilin' over!”

Then he jumped for the broom handle.

Snowshoe Brown eyed critically the garment which the other man placed dripping in the dishpan.

“A ten-year-old boy can't git in that shirt oncet it's dry. All the years you've batched, you'd ought to know better than to bile flannens!”

“I forgot,” Mr. Luckenbach said meekly. “I do know better when I think of it.”

“Look heree, old man. You're tolable well-fixed. Why don't you git married?”

Instantly Mr. Luckenbach's eyes gleamed ominously and he inquired coldly:

“What for?”

“It would save you a world of trouble. You wouldn't have to warsh and you'd git out of doin' dishes.”

“Why don't you?” came the tart rejoinder.

Disconcerted for a moment, Snowshoe replied candidly:

“I did. That's why I'm afoot, as you might say. But I had special bad luck, and I wasn't choosey enough when I was younger. You go ahead and try it. It'll beat this way of livin' all holler.”

Mr. Luckenbach was too sickened to answer. “Why don't you get married? Why don't you get married?” Somebody was always asking the question and he was good and tired of it. He was upset and irritable long after the cessation of the sound of rattling rocks told him that Brown and his pack horse had crossed the shale and were around the point of the mountain.

Not that Mr. Luckenbach was exactly a woman hater; he admitted that females had their place in the scheme of the universe, but how could he personally be benefited by a matrimonial alliance? His own cooking did not kill him; he almost never made his bed; and since he washed his clothes only once a season, it was not a great tax upon him. Therefore, he argued, having a woman around asking silly questions and worrying because nobody was passing was too great a price to pay for having his housework done for him.

Love was an emotional hysteria which anybody could control if he wanted to and a state with which Mr. Luckenbach had small patience.

Brown's question, however, had the effect of directing his thoughts to the several women of his acquaintance in Mud Springs, and as he returned to his work at the rocker, he reflected upon certain peculiarities with which each was always associated in his mind.

Mrs. Jubb, who kept the stopping place that he patronized during his semiannual trips for supplies, he remembered chiefly for the form of her greeting, which never varied and which grated upon him exceedingly:

“How are you, Luckenbach? Put your war bag up in the loft. The cabin's full, so you gotta sleep in the buck pasture.”

From Mrs. Jubb, he passed on to Mrs. Detweiler, who spent her waking hours in the rear of her husband's store in a chair made out of a whisky barrel. The upholstering was red calico padded with bear grass, twisted while green and sun dried, so that, when untied, it curled beautifully and was wonderful for cushions or mattresses. The curves of the chair were such that it was semienveloping, and when Mrs. Detweiler, who was squat and weighed considerably over two hundred, occupied it, she seemed to be clamped in. Each trip Mr. Luckenbach noticed that she had increasing difficulty in rising without bringing the chair with her, and he felt sure the time was not far distant when the chair either would have to be knocked to pieces or Mrs. Detweiler pried out with a crowbar.

Then there was Myra Riggs, who kept the post office, with a side line of apples and oranges and gumdrops in wooden buckets. Mrs. Riggs' protruding lips looked as if a hornet had stung them and the swelling had never subsided. It was one of Mr. Luckenbach's diversions to sit in the post office evenings and look at her shadow as it fell in profile upon the wallpaper. The silhouette had no resemblance to that of a human being.

There were some three other ladies of his acquaintance with distinguishing characteristics, but the lot of them were all alike in that they gabbled incessantly and without intelligence, and took an insane interest in ready-made clothing and the fashions as set forth by Monkton-Shears catalogues. And not one of them had a forehead much wider than his two fingers!

Mr. Luckenbach would have snorted at the suggestion that he had an ideal, yet as some men observe a woman's hands, her feet, her teeth, upon a first meeting, invariably he looked at her forehead.

At four o'clock, he stopped work and “cleaned up,” a proceeding that resulted in a profitable showing; after which he went to his cabin to prepare supper for himself and Callimachus and Alciabiades.

Mr. Luckenbach was a vegetarian; so, also, of necessity were the cat and dog who respectively bore these distinguished names. But they made no pretence of liking the beans and turnips which he set out on a tin plate for them, eating lukewarmly and without quarreling. In the season, Callimachus varied his diet with grasshoppers, and Alcibiades sometimes caught a young and inexperienced rabbit, but mostly they lay dispiritedly, watching their master at the rocker.

Contrary to his usual custom, in his eagerness to get at his book, to-day Mr. Luckenbach did not cook, but set out a cold baking-powder biscuit and some stewed fruit made of a mixture of raisins and prunes, while Callimachus and Alcibiades looked their disgust at a couple of cold potatoes placed on the floor for them. This meal concluded, he filled the lamp and cleaned the chimney and sat down for a long, pleasant evening in the company of his favorite Greeks.

When he went to work the next morning, it would have been patent to a person a mile away that something had stirred Herman Luckenbach deeply. His state of mind showed in the way he thumped his heels down when he walked, in the violence with which he dumped the contents of the gold pan into the grizzly, in erratic movement of the rocker which sent the concentrates rushing into the river instead of retaining them upon the Brussels-carpet apron. He winked rapidly as he worked and talked to himself in precise, but vigorous language.

Finally he hurled the lard can, which had been ingeniously converted into a dipper, upon the rocks so hard that it nearly bounced into the, river. When he stamped toward the cabin, it was very clear that he had made up his mind to do something decisive.

In truth, Mr. Luckenbach was furious—furious with the famous mail-order house of Monkton-Shears Co., of Chicago. After enjoying his patronage for all of twenty years, they had at last betrayed him! He had made up his mind that they should know he knew it. When a man spends one dollar and seventy-nine cents for a book, he expects to get something for his money; and so he meant to tell them. He had been cheated, buncoed, his intelligence insulted, by a firm in which he had had complete confidence.

He had the letter he meant to write them well in mind before he started for the cabin, so the words came fluently. When it was finally completed, signed, and blotted, Mr. Luckenbach, who was as free from vanity as a man well could be, regarded it as a distinct achievement. The writing was like copper-plate, with the capitals nicely shaded; the punctuation brought out his meaning exactly; and the tone, while dignified and respectful, was firm and explicit.

Beginning with the satisfaction with which he had eaten of their canned goods, worn their woolen underwear, used their bedrock scraper, and taken their spring tonic, he reminded them of the forbearance he had shown when, instead of the “New Pictorial History of the World,” they had mailed a publication entitled “Two Bad Blue Eyes.” Now he wished to call their attention to his latest order—“Men and Days of Ancient Greece.” Not only had he found eight typographical errors, five misspelled proper names, but a serious misstatement, which he could not overlook. According to the author, Pythagoras had been “vanquished.” This was obviously impossible, since Pythagoras was not a warrior, but a philosopher. The word should have been “banished.” The mistakes were sufficiently numerous and serious, in his opinion, to warrant the suspension of further printings until they had been corrected. He added that he would like to hear from them.

It caused as much comment as a snowstorm in July to see Mr. Luckenbach in Mud Springs before the fifteenth of August, which was his exact date for arriving to purchase his winter's supplies, but he made no explanation beyond saying that he had a letter of importance to mail and had come up for that purpose.

The rumor was immediately circulated that he must have had an offer for his placer ground from the “Guggenheimers.”

In due time, the communication marked “personal” reached Mr. Shears, who laid it upon the desk of his highly competent secretary, Miss Mary Rondthaler, with a “mem” instructing her to send a reply calculated to soothe a peevish customer.

Miss Rondthaler was possessed of many superior qualities, foremost of which was her even temper. This, together with her tact and judgment, made her one of the firm's valued employees. Neither Mr. Shears nor the office force outside had ever seen her ruffled, and since the latter had made many earnest efforts and failed flatly, it was doubted whether it could be accomplished.

The morning of the receipt of Mr. Luckenbach's letter, it remained for Aggie Stetson, who chewed gum, painted scandalously, perfumed herself highly, and could not take dictation correctly to save her life, to find the vulnerable spot in Miss Rondthaler's armor.

She looked up from the headlines of a paper she was reading, as Mr. Shears' secretary was hurrying through the office, and called after her:

“Oh, Miss Rondthaler, ain't you awful glad about this new ordinance?”

“To what ordinance do you refer, Miss Stetson?”

Aggie Stetson's eyes danced mischievously.

“The one about 'mashing.' You can have a 'masher' arrested now if he speaks to you.”

Miss Rondthaler arched her slender neck inside her immaculate linen collar and replied haughtily:

“I conduct myself in such a manner that I never have been annoyed, so naturally the matter does not interest me.”

She could have bitten her tongue off immediately she had said it, and the audible snickers made her color as she passed on to the inner office. She knew what they thought perfectly, quite as well as if they had said it—that she was not sufficiently attractive to gain even the attention of that odious class who make advances to unescorted women.

For fifteen years, Miss Rondthaler, in daylight and dark, had passed up and down the city's streets without once being ogled, pinched, pursued, or even chirped at and addressed as “birdie.” She could go anywhere, it seemed, in perfect safety, with as little danger of annoyance from the creatures whose activities finally had resulted in the passing of the ordinance that made “mashing” a misdemeanor, punishable by a fine or imprisonment or both, as if she wore trousers.

Deep in the innermost recesses of her heart, it rankled. It was the same feeling she had used to have when the bad boys washed all the other girls' faces with snow and left her a bystander. She had never admitted that the omission hurt her and that she yearned to have her face scoured as red as a beefsteak, but had endeavored to comfort herself with the thought that they respected her too highly to play so rough with her.

A predestined wall flower and spinster from infancy, Miss Rondthaler found solace in the quotation that stood on her bureau: “He rides the fastest who rides alone.”

As she passed on to the inner office, her hand shook; so she was all of a minute locating her hatpin, while she told herself hotly that she was too obviously a lady ever to be molested, and that painted huzzy was just the sort that slipped her name and address into hatbands going to out-of-town customers, and she—Miss Rondthaler—knew it!

She adjusted her paper cuffs with excessive energy and removed the cover of her typewriter as if she had a personal grudge against it.

It was in this frame of mind that she read Mr. Luckenbach's letter. If she had looked sour before, she looked sourer when she had finished.

A man who would take the trouble to write and complain about a few unimportant typographical errors must have a lot to do! Some smart Aleck anxious to air his knowledge! He seemed to smirk at her as she visualized him.

It was an unfair advantage to take of her employers, but she made the occasion an excuse to work off some of her red-hot indignation when she answered it.

In obvious sarcasm, she expressed the firm's deep gratitude for his few kind words in praise of their woolen underwear, their spring tonic, and their bedrock scraper, groveling verbally as she conveyed their regrets and humiliation because of his dissatisfaction with the book in which he had found so many inexcusable errors. Then, intoxicated by her success at sarcasm, she added:

“If you think you can improve it, why not come on and try it?”

Having inked the facsimile of the Monkton-Shears' signatures, she pounded the rubber stamp down viciously, addressed the envelope, and mailed it immediately.

Mr. Luckenbach never realized how many warm friends he had in Mud Springs until he came to leave it.

When it was learned that he was leaving for an indefinite period, to engage in some literary work for Monkton, Shears & Company, there was not enough they could do for him. “Hod” Detweiler took special pains. in outfitting him from his stock of ready-made clothing, even going to the length of loaning him his own modish green waistcoat, which he had purchased on his last trip to Seattle. While, from her chair in the rear of the store, Mrs. Detweiler gave him the benefit of her taste when it came to selecting neck-wear.

Myra Riggs presented him with a bag of bananas that were not yet too far gone to be palatable, and loaned him her nearly new canvas telescope, So that he should not feel himself among strangers, the blacksmith gave him the address of a boarding house kept by a lady who had gone to school with his sister. It was incredible, but there were tears of sentiment in Mr. Luckenbach's eyes the last time Mrs. Jubb assigned him to the buck pasture. He determined that, no matter what honors the future might bring to him, he would never forget the kindness of these humble folk—never, never!

The excitement of travel and of seeing so many people—not to mention the fatigue of carrying close to forty pounds of rock in the way of ore samples, slipped into his canvas telescope by divers prospectors in the hope that while “on East” he might interest capital—combined to tire Mr. Luckenbach to such an extent that he went to bed immediately after supper, once he had reached Chicago.

In consequence, he was awake in the morning about the time the sparrows began to squeak and long before the rattle of the milk bottles. He had not replied to Monkton-Shears' letter, deciding that the best answer to their invitation was himself, so now he lay for some time, picturing their surprise and pleasure at his promptness.

One's appearance, as he knew, was of considerable importance in the city, so he gave some little time to the act of dressing, adjusting the rubber loop on his red necktie carefully over the bone collar button and removing mud stains from his shoes with a soiled handkerchief. While buttoning the large pearl buttons on the bottle-green waistcoat, he regarded himself in the mirror with something like satisfaction. Clothes certainly did make a difference.

The boarding house kept by the lady who had gone to school with the blacksmith's sister was situated well out in the suburbs, and since Monkton-Shears' establishment was in the heart of the city, he started early, that they might know he was no dawdler. Opportunity had battered on his door with a thunderous knock, and he meant to grab her by the foretop.

On the car going into the city, he fell to considering his fellow passengers.

Mr. Luckenbach was not a superstitious person or one easily astonished, yet his sensation was something of each as the first thing his eyes rested upon was “Men and Days of Ancient Greece” in the hands of a woman, more or less young, in the seat across the aisle from him.

Immediately he focused his attention upon its reader.

In the first place, he was impressed by the fact that a lady should find a book of this nature interesting; he could not conceive of Mrs. Jubb, Myra Riggs, or Mrs. Detweiler reading it voluntarily. It was irrefutable evidence of this woman's mental superiority. He started slightly. She had the forehead of his ideal! Her stiff-brimmed sailor having slipped to the back of her head, he had a fine view of it.

Aggie Stetson declared that Miss Rondthaler had a forehead like a roll-top desk, newly varnished; to Mr. Luckenbach it denoted rare intelligence, and certain bumps indicated a capacity for mathematics and languages. His eyes sought her feet, and he felt a thrill of elation that he had not been mistaken. They were the shoes of a sensible woman—square toes and nearly heelless. How neat, too, her linen collar! And he considered her mouth attentively. It was generous and firm, while the striking redness of her lips seemed to speak of excellent circulation.

How could Mr. Luckenbach know that, goaded by the taunts of Aggie Stetson, Miss Rondthaler had bought a lipstick, with something of the secrecy with which one buys strychnine for the neighbor's barking dog?

There was not a single point about the lady, he decided, which did not meet with his entire approval. And what a privilege it would be to know her! This thought was followed by another. In view of his connection with Monkton, Shears & Company, might it not be his duty to warn her of the inaccuracies in the book she was reading and explain that they were to be corrected? Should he not do as he would wish to be done by?

The concentration of his gaze attracted Miss Rondthaler's attention. When she looked up, Mr. Luckenbach smiled at her pleasantly. She lowered her eyes and raised them almost immediately to see if he was still looking. He was, and with increased friendliness.

Miss Rondthaler blushed guiltily. She found her handkerchief and wiped her lips surreptitiously. It must be she had applied the lipstick too liberally and looked “fast.”

It had no effect whatever upon Mr. Luckenbach, who continued to regard her with unabated interest, his mind engaged in framing the exact words in which he should address her, while Miss Rondthaler fidgeted, finding that “Men and Days of Ancient Greece” could no longer hold her attention.

When her street was called, she arose, and Mr. Luckenbach did likewise. It was another coincidence which impressed him strongly that she should get off at his own destination.

Miss Rondthaler saw him swing off the car and her heart beat rapidly. It would have been possible to have seen it thumping through her shirtwaist when the sound of footsteps behind her told her that she was followed. She quickened her gait so that it was close to a trot; but she could not lose Mr. Luckenbach, who was determined to overtake her. It was like a game of hare and hounds as he kept her in sight through a congestion of vehicles on a crossing. When she whisked around a corner, he was still after her. He was gaining—— If only she could reach Mr. Casey in the doorway yonder!

Mr. Casey reached for his collar. “Mashin' again—you loafer!” “Madam—one moment!” Mr. Luckenbach panted.

She felt a thrill of exultation even as she demanded:

“How dare you?”

Mr. Casey bounded from the doorway.

Miss Rondthaler clutched his arm and pointed dramatically at Mr. Luckenbach, who was breathing heavily.

“Arrest that man, officer!”

Mr. Casey reached for his collar.

“Mashin' again—you loafer!”

Mr. Luckenbach struggled.

“Resist an officer, will ye?”

Simultaneously with the superfluous question, Mr. Luckenbach's new derby cracked like the English-walnut shell it so much resembled.

It sounded like his skull, and immediately Miss Rondthaler pleaded:

“Please don't hurt him! I don't believe he'll ever do it again.”

Mr. Luckenbach did not look as if he would ever do anything again, after another futile struggle, he was dragged to the box and leaned against a telegraph pole while Casey rang for the wagon.

“You'll have to appear against him to-morrow mornin', ma'am.”

“Oh, I couldn't do that! I might get in the papers.”

“If you ladies don't do your part, us police can't do anything,” Casey said severely.

There was this phase of it to be considered, Miss Rondthaler admitted, and promised, but another that she did not mention was the thought of Aggie Stetson's face when she saw her picture in the paper as the victim of a masher's attentions.

The look Miss Rondthaler gave Aggie Stetson as, fifteen minutes late, she hurried through the outer office, made the latter wonder if she had had another raise in salary, while Mr. Shears glanced up from his desk in surprise to see his secretary, whose calm ordinarily was something supernatural, with her hat awry, her immaculate collar wilted, and a high color.

“What's the matter? Anything happened?”

Miss Rondthaler's eyes were downcast as she snapped and unsnapped the clasp of her washable doeskins and faltered:

“No, sir—yes, sir.”

“You needn't be afraid to tell me,” urged Mr. Shears kindly.

“I—I was followed—by a masher.”

“No!” There was more incredulity than indignation in the exclamation.

“I had him arrested.”

“Good for you! I hope they soak him! When do you appear against him?”

“To-morrow morning.”

“What kind of a looking guy was he?”

“Not a guy at all,” Miss Rondthaler replied with a touch of asperity, “but a really respectable, scholarly looking person.” She very nearly said “gentleman.”

Mr. Luckenbach rode to the station house in a patrol wagon, atracting more attention than he ever had attracted in his life. There he was subjected to further indignities and charged with disorderly conduct and resisting an officer. No attention whatever was paid to his protests, and he was hustled to a cell, where the iron grating was slammed shut upon him.

Outraged and bewildered, he paced to and fro, endeavoring to realize his position. He gathered from the gist of the conversations that his real offense was “mashing.” He could make nothing of it.

Since the most modern work in Mr. Luckenbach's library was a description of the Battle of Waterloo, by Hugo, and since the chaste columns of the Boston Weekly, which kept him abreast of the times, were never defiled by the slang of the period, many words had their vogue and passed on to oblivion without ever coming to his knowledge.

Such expressions as “To beat the band,” and “Wouldn't that jar you?” had reached him through the medium of Snowshoe Brown, but he considered them absurd and meaningless and chided Brown for polluting the purity of the English language. Therefore, the only definition of mashing with which he was familiar was: “the act of bruising, crushing, reducing to a pulp.” Certainly the last thing in the world he had desired to do was to bruise, crush, or reduce to a pulp that altogether admirable lady!

She was responsible for his present humiliating condition, yet he felt no rancor, and he never wavered in his first opinion that she had a truly fine forehead and was a splendid character. His desire to set himself right with her took precedence over everything.

A wonder as to what Mud Springs would say if it knew he was spending his second day and night “on East” in a police station sometimes came to him, but mostly he burned with shame at thought of her opinion of him.

He recalled the serenity with which the Greek philosophers had borne themselves in trying circumstances, and endeavored to emulate their example, but when, after a dreadful, sleepless night, he was herded into the police court, he found that he was unable to rise above his predicament, for not only was he physically miserable, but he was as nervous as if he had been guilty.

Haggard, unshaven, and humped up on a bench between a plain drunk and a footpad, his altered appearance was such as to touch a harder heart than Miss Rondthaler's. Then, too, the gaze he fixed upon her, though troubled, could not be interpreted as holding anything but respect for her.

When the case was called and Miss Rondthaler was sworn, she related the facts with such an absence of malice, with such reluctance even, that it made an excellent impression. Casey corroborated her story, dwelling with particular emphasis upon the violence with which the prisoner had resisted arrest. At the conclusion of his testimony, the magistrate thundered:

“Stand up, Luckenbach.”

Mr. Luckenbach crept forward.

“Where do you live?”

“Mud Springs, Idaho, is my post office,” he replied meekly.

“One of these Western sports, eh? What are you doing here? Have you an occupation other than 'mashing'?”

Mr. Luckenbach straightened, and in spite of the fact that his flaring bow necktie was at an angle and that, in buttoning his bottle-green waistcoat, he had inadvertently skipped a button, so that one side was some two inches longer than the other, there was no gainsaying his dignity as he turned and faced Miss Rondthaler.

“Address yourself to the court,” he was ordered.

But the court did not exist for Mr. Luckenbach; he realized merely that this was his opportunity to explain to the only person whose opinion he cared for, and he was determined that nothing should prevent it.

Very clearly and precisely he stated that he had come “on East” at the request of Monkton, Shears & Company to make certain corrections in a book entitled “Men and Days of Ancient Greece,” and that, seeing the volume in her hands, he had wished to inform her of certain inaccuracies. His intentions had been of the best, he insisted, and in conclusion he pleaded:

“Believe me, the last thought in my mind was to—to mash you.”

Court attachés, reporters, counsel, spectators laughed cynically while the magistrate said harshly:

“Too fishy, Luckenbach. I'm going to fine you twenty-five dollars and give you sixty days to think up a better story. You birds of prey will get the limit in this court and——”

Trembling violently and of an alarming pallor, Miss Rondthaler rose to her feet and interrupted shrilly:

“It's the truth, your honor, I am Mr. Shears' secretary. I wrote the letter that asked him to come on and correct the errors. The book has inaccuracies.” Rolling her handkerchief into a small, moist wad between her palms, she cried dramatically, “If anybody goes to prison, it must be I. He is innocent!”

“I can't say I understand exactly,” said the magistrate severely, “but I presume you are endeavoring to admit that you encouraged him?”

“Y-yes,” Miss Rondthaler gasped feebly. “It was my fault entirely.”

Mr. Luckenbach eluded his guardian and, with outstretched hands, impulsively bounded forward.

“My dear young lady! My dear, dear young lady!”

“Can you ever forgive me?” she asked piteously.

“Forgive you!” His voice and eyes were so eloquent of admiration that Miss Rondthaler blushed furiously.

It was not so many days later that she asked constrainedly:

“Herman, after the book, was it my lips that first attracted your attention?”

“No, darling,” enthusiastically, “your forehead—your truly noble forehead!”