nk, both her white hands were clasped over his arm as loving as the
soft paws of a kitten, and he looked like a fellow that had been out
shooting doves, and had come in with his net full.

They went in to lunch, and ate spring chickens; then they ended off with
silly-bubs, which is a sweet froth that melts to nothing on the
tongue--delicious, but not exactly hearty food.

Two hours after lunch, the stranger asked the widow to ride out with
him; which she did, in the puffiest and silkiest of dresses, and with a
lace parasol, lined with pink, between her and the sun. This was one of
her snares, for she depended on that pink lining for her blushes,
having left them a good way behind her somewhere about the first
wedding.

The drive was paradisical. They talked, they smiled, they said the
loveliest little things to each other with delicious reciprocity. He
drove, and divided his manly attentions between her and the horses,
giving her a generous share, which was creditable to him as a man.

It was nearly twelve o'clock that night when those two people went up to
their neglected couches--nothing but a widow would have stood the shock
of such impropriety among the critical of her sex; but she didn't care a
mite.

Early the next morning, which was Sunday, these two persons were seen
coming out of the little cubby-houses under the beach in the queerest
sort of dresses--I cannot describe them, because, up to this time, beach
flirtations have been forbidden subjects with me.

But they came out on the beach, clasped hands, and walked right into the
biggest waves they could find.

What she said to him there I cannot tell, but by and by they came back
to the hotel, the sneakiest-looking creatures you ever set your two eyes
on.

I don't know when it was that she brought him to the point, but the
widow had netted him so close that he didn't even try to flounder.

That night there was sacred music in the hotel parlor, and, somehow, a
minister of the Gospel dropped in, with a white cravat on, and waited
for something, looking as if butter wouldn't melt in his mouth.

He hadn't been there long before the strange gentleman came in with a
swallow-tailed coat on, a white vest and cravat, with ball-gloves on his
hands.

Hanging on to his arm was that widow, in a long, white dress, that
streamed after her in windrows, and with a shower of lace falling over
her.

The minister got up, and opened his book. The people hanging about