the
West Side--one never knows." Their house was an adaptation of the
"mission style" of California and possessed one big room on the first
floor which their friends called Congress Hall.

Miss Franklin was certain that this circle would enjoy the Captain once
he became at ease, and she really hoped Mrs. Brent would "advise the
girl," and, as she put it, "Help her to get at the pleasant side of
Chicago. She's very rich and she's intelligent, but she is very raw!
She's very like a boy, but she's worth while. She wanted me to come with
her, but I could have done so only by giving up here and going as her
companion, and that I'm not ready to do--at present."

After carefully considering all these points, Mrs. Brent 'phoned her
friends, being careful to explain that Dorothy Franklin had sent her
"some fleecy specimens of Colorado society," and that she was asking a
few of "the bold and fearless" among her set to meet them.

"Who are the guests of honor?" she was asked by each favored one.

Each received the same reply: "Marshall Haney, the gambler prince of
Cripple Creek, and his bride, Dead-shot Nell, biscuit-shooter, from
Honey Gulch."

"Honest?"

"Hope to die!"

"It's too good to be true! Of course I'll come. Do we have a quiet game
after dinner?"

"Ah, no, that would be too cruel--to Captain Haney. No; we go to the
theatre. So be on hand at 7 P.M., sharp."

In this way she had prepared her friends to be surprised by Bertha's
good looks and the Captain's tame and courteous manner, but was herself
soundly jarred when her "wild-West people" came up to the door in an
auto-car that must have cost five or six thousand dollars, and when a
colored footman, in bottle-green uniform, leaped out to open the door
for them (it was Lucius in his new suit--he was playing all the parts).
Brent, with a comical look at his wife, remarked: "I suppose this is in
lieu of broncos?"

"They _are_ branching out!" she gasped. "And see her clothes!"

She might well exclaim, for Bertha, in her long cloak, her head bare,
and her pretty dress showing, did not in the least resemble the picture
Miss Franklin had drawn; neither did she resemble the demure, almost
sullen girl Mrs. Brent had met in the hotel. The Captain, too, for the
second time in his life, wore evening dress, but citing to his sombrero;
so that he resembled a Tennessee congressman at the Inaugural Ball as he
came slowly up the short walk, and Mrs. Brent deeply regretted t