ckly, pulled it to with a bang, as if he had just come in, and
stalked upstairs in dignity. Never has a man more conscious and
oppressive rectitude than one who has barely escaped a dreadful plight.
No word came from the just-awakened terror in a night-dress. He had been
saved--saved by Simpson.

The word of Jason B. Grampus had never been violated, and never could
be. His first duty when he reached his office in the morning was to send
for Simpson.

"The key worked," he said, "and you may have my daughter."

Simpson has her now and is his father-in-law's partner in business.
Sometimes, looking at the color of his wife's eyes, and the graceful
but somewhat square conformation of her jaws, he wonders a little what
experiences time may bring him. But she is different from her mother in
many ways, and Simpson is a more adaptative and inventive man than his
father-in-law ever was. He is not much worried.

CHRISTMAS 200,000 B.C.

It was Christmas in the year 200,000 B.C. It is true that it was not
called Christmas then--our ancestors at that date were not much given
to the celebration of religious festivals--but, taking the Gregorian
calendar and counting backward just 200,000 plus 1887 years this
particular day would be located. There was no formal celebration, but,
nevertheless, a good deal was going on in the neighborhood of the home
of Fangs. Names were not common at the time mentioned, but the more
advanced of the cave-dwellers had them. Man had so far advanced that
only traces of his ape origin remained, and he had begun to have a
language. It was a queer "clucking" sort of language, something like
that of the Bushmen, the low type of man yet to be found in Africa, and
it was not very useful in the expression of ideas, but then primitive
man didn't have many ideas to express. Names, so far as used, were at
this time derived merely from some personal quality or peculiarity.
Fangs was so called because of his huge teeth. His mate was called She
Fox; his daughter, not Nellie, nor Jennie, nor Mamie--young ladies did
not affect the "ie" then--but Red Lips. She was, for the age,
remarkably pretty and refined. She could cast eyes which told a story at
a suitor, and there were several kinds of snake she would not eat. She
was a merry, energetic girl, and was the most useful member of the
family in tree-climbing. She was an only child and rather petted. Her
father or mother rarely knocked her down with a very heavy