r without warning, the door was thrown open and a
second officer strode into their midst dragging by the arm the reluctant
Jimmy.

"I guess I've got somethin' here that you folks need in your business,"
he called, nodding toward the now utterly demoralised Jimmy.

"Jimmy!" exclaimed Aggie, having at last got her breath.

"The Joker!" cried Alfred, bearing down upon the panting Jimmy with a
ferocious expression.

"I caught him slipping down the fire-escape," explained the officer.

"Again?" exclaimed Aggie and Alfred in tones of deep reproach.

"Jimmy," said Alfred, coming close to his friend, and fixing his eyes
upon him in a determined effort to control the poor creature's fast
failing faculties, "you know the truth of this thing. You are the one
who sent me that telegram, you are the one who told me that I was a
father."

"Well, aren't you a father?" asked Aggie, trying to protect her dejected
spouse.

"Of course I am," replied Alfred, with every confidence, "but I have to
prove it to the officer. Jimmy knows," he concluded. Then turning to
the uncomfortable man at his side, he demanded imperatively, "Tell the
officer the truth, you idiot. No more of your jokes. Am I a father or am
I not?"

"If you're depending on ME for your future offspring," answered Jimmy,
wagging his head with the air of a man reckless of consequences, "you
are NOT a father."

"Depending on YOU?" gasped Alfred, and he stared at his friend in
bewilderment. "What do you mean by that?"

"Ask them," answered Jimmy, and he nodded toward Zoie and Aggie.

Alfred appealed to Aggie.

"Ask Zoie," said Aggie.

Alfred bent over the form of the again prostrate Zoie. "My darling,"
he entreated, "rouse yourself." Slowly she opened her eyes. "Now," said
Alfred, with enforced self-control, "you must look the officer squarely
in the eye and tell him whose babies those are," and he nodded toward
the officer, who was now beginning to entertain grave doubts on the
subject.

"How should _I_ know?" cried Zoie, too exhausted for further lying.

"What!" exclaimed Alfred, his hand on his forehead.

"I only borrowed them," said Zoie, "to get you home," and with that she
sank back on the couch and closed her eyes.

"What did I tell you?" cried the triumphant O'Flarety.

"I guess they're your'n all right," admitted the officer doggedly, and
he grudgingly released the three infants to their rightful parents.

"I guess they'd better be," shouted O'Fla