of the porch.

"I thought you'd gone out, Willie," said his mother, as they paused
beside him.

"Ma'am?"

"Adelia said you went out, carrying your suit-case."

"Oh yes," he said, languidly. "If you leave clothes at Schwartz's in the
evening they have 'em pressed in the morning. You said I looked damp at
dinner, so I took 'em over and left 'em there."

"I see." Mrs. Baxter followed her husband to the door, but she stopped
on the threshold and called back:

"Don't sit there too long, Willie."

"Ma'am?"

"The dew is falling and it rained so hard to-day--I'm afraid it might be
damp."

"Ma'am?"

"Come on," Mr. Baxter said to his wife. "He's down on the Parchers'
porch, not out in front here. Of course he can't hear you. It's three
blocks and a half."

But William's father was mistaken. Little he knew! William was not upon
the porch of the Parchers, with May Parcher and Joe Bullitt and Johnnie
Watson to interfere. He was far from there, in a land where time was
not. Upon a planet floating in pink mist, and uninhabited--unless old
Mr. Genesis and some Hindoo princes and the diligent Iowan may have
established themselves in its remoter regions--William was alone with
Miss Pratt, in the conservatory. And, after a time, they went together,
and looked into the door of a room where an indefinite number of little
boys--all over three years of age--were playing in the firelight upon a
white-bear rug. For, in the roseate gossamer that boys' dreams are made
of, William had indeed entered the married state.

His condition was growing worse, every day.

XVIII

THE BIG, FAT LUMMOX

In the morning sunshine, Mrs. Baxter stood at the top of the steps of
the front porch, addressing her son, who listened impatiently and edged
himself a little nearer the gate every time he shifted his weight from
one foot to the other.

"Willie," she said, "you must really pay some attention to the laws of
health, or you'll never live to be an old man."

"I don't want to live to be an old man," said William, earnestly. "I'd
rather do what I please now and die a little sooner."

"You talk very foolishly," his mother returned. "Either come back and
put on some heavier THINGS or take your overcoat."

"My overcoat!" William groaned. "They'd think I was a lunatic, carrying
an overcoat in August!"

"Not to a picnic," she said.

"Mother, it isn't a picnic, I've told you a hunderd times! You think
it's one those ole-fashion things Y