the sufferings of Father Goriot were
still keen. "That's all you think of. Aren't you sorry for the people
who haven't anything to-night?"

"Of course I am," said Lola; "but what can I do? I haven't anything."

Carrie smiled.

"You wouldn't care, if you had," she returned.

"I would, too," said Lola. "But people never gave me anything when I was
hard up."

"Isn't it just awful?" said Carrie, studying the winter's storm.

"Look at that man over there," laughed Lola, who had caught sight of
some one falling down. "How sheepish men look when they fall, don't
they?"

"We'll have to take a coach to-night," answered Carrie absently.

In the lobby of the Imperial, Mr. Charles Drouet was just arriving,
shaking the snow from a very handsome ulster. Bad weather had driven him
home early and stirred his desire for those pleasures which shut out the
snow and gloom of life. A good dinner, the company of a young woman, and
an evening at the theatre were the chief things for him.

"Why, hello, Harry!" he said, addressing a lounger in one of the
comfortable lobby chairs. "How are you?"

"Oh, about six and six," said the other. "Rotten weather, isn't it?"

"Well, I should say," said the other. "I've been just sitting here
thinking where I'd go to-night."

"Come along with me," said Drouet. "I can introduce you to something
dead swell."

"Who is it?" said the other.

"Oh, a couple of girls over here in Fortieth Street. We could have a
dandy time. I was just looking for you."

"Supposing you get 'em and take 'em out to dinner?"

"Sure," said Drouet. "Wait'll I go upstairs and change my clothes."

"Well, I'll be in the barber shop," said the other. "I want to get a
shave."

"All right," said Drouet, creaking off in his good shoes toward the
elevator. The old butterfly was as light on the wing as ever.

On an incoming vestibuled Pullman, speeding at forty miles an hour
through the snow of the evening, were three others, all related.

"First call for dinner in the dining-car," a Pullman servitor was
announcing, as he hastened through the aisle in snow-white apron and
jacket.

"I don't believe I want to play any more," said the youngest, a
black-haired beauty, turned supercilious by fortune, as she pushed a
euchre hand away from her.

"Shall we go into dinner?" inquired her husband, who was all that fine
raiment can make.

"Oh, not yet," she answered. "I don't want to play any more, though."

"Jessica," sai