working in that store, and as shabby as ever. And how
about that big catch you were going to make--nothing doing yet, I
suppose?"

And then Lou looked, and saw that something better than prosperity
had descended upon Nancy--something that shone brighter than gems
in her eyes and redder than a rose in her cheeks, and that danced
like electricity anxious to be loosed from the tip of her tongue.

"Yes, I'm still in the store," said Nancy, "but I'm going to leave it
next week. I've made my catch--the biggest catch in the world. You
won't mind now Lou, will you?--I'm going to be married to Dan--to
Dan!--he's my Dan now--why, Lou!"

Around the corner of the park strolled one of those new-crop,
smooth-faced young policemen that are making the force more
endurable--at least to the eye. He saw a woman with an expensive fur
coat, and diamond-ringed hands crouching down against the iron fence
of the park sobbing turbulently, while a slender, plainly-dressed
working girl leaned close, trying to console her. But the Gibsonian
cop, being of the new order, passed on, pretending not to notice,
for he was wise enough to know that these matters are beyond help so
far as the power he represents is concerned, though he rap the
pavement with his nightstick till the sound goes up to the
furthermost stars.

A MADISON SQUARE ARABIAN NIGHT

To Carson Chalmers, in his apartment near the square, Phillips
brought the evening mail. Beside the routine correspondence there
were two items bearing the same foreign postmark.

One of the incoming parcels contained a photograph of a woman. The
other contained an interminable letter, over which Chalmers hung,
absorbed, for a long time. The letter was from another woman; and
it contained poisoned barbs, sweetly dipped in honey, and feathered
with innuendoes concerning the photographed woman.

Chalmers tore this letter into a thousand bits and began to wear out
his expensive rug by striding back and forth upon it. Thus an animal
from the jungle acts when it is caged, and thus a caged man acts
when he is housed in a jungle of doubt.

By and by the restless mood was overcome. The rug was not an
enchanted one. For sixteen feet he could travel along it; three
thousand miles was beyond its power to aid.

Phillips appeared. He never entered; he invariably appeared, like a
well-oiled genie.

"Will you dine here, sir, or out?" he asked.

"Here," said Chalmers, "and in half an hour." He listen