woman living
who could actually make a Pullman drawing-room look homelike."

"Any woman who has spent a fourth of her life in hotels and trains
learns that trick. She has to. If she happens to be the sort that
likes books and flowers and sewing, she carries some of each with her.
And one book, one rose, and one piece of unfinished embroidery would
make an oasis in the Sahara Desert look homelike."

It was on the westbound train that they encountered Sam--Sam of the
rolling eye, the genial grin, the deft hand. Sam was known to every
hardened traveler as the porter de luxe of the road. Sam was a
diplomat, a financier, and a rascal. He never forgot a face. He never
forgave a meager tip. The passengers who traveled with him were at
once his guests and his victims.

Therefore his, "Good evenin', Mis' McChesney, ma'am. Good even'!
Well, it suh't'nly has been a long time sense Ah had the pleasuh of yoh
presence as passengah, ma'am. Ah sure am----"

The slim, elegant figure of T. A. Buck appeared in the doorway. Sam's
rolling eye became a thing on ball bearings. His teeth flashed
startlingly white in the broadest of grins. He took Buck's hat, ran a
finger under its inner band, and shook it very gently.

"What's the idea?" inquired Buck genially. "Are you a combination
porter and prestidigitator?"

Sam chuckled his infectious negro chuckle.

"Well, no, sah! Ah wouldn' go's fah as t' say that, sah. But Ah hab
been known to shake rice out of a gen'lman's ordinary, ever'-day, black
derby hat."

"Get out!" laughed T. A. Buck, as Sam ducked.

"You may as well get used to it," smiled Emma, "because I'm known to
every train-conductor, porter, hotel-clerk, chamber-maid, and bell-boy
between here and the Great Lakes."

It was Sam who proved himself hero of the honeymoon, for he saved T. A.
Buck from continuing his journey to Chicago brideless. Fifteen minutes
earlier, Buck had gone to the buffet-car for a smoke. At Cleveland,
Emma, looking out of the car window, saw a familiar figure pacing up
and down the station platform. It was that dapper and important little
Irishman, O'Malley, buyer for Gage & Fosdick, the greatest mail-order
house in the world--O'Malley, whose letter T. A. Buck had answered;
O'Malley, whose order meant thousands. He was on his way to New York,
of course.

In that moment Mrs. T. A. Buck faded into the background and Emma
McChesney rose up in her place. She snatched hat and coat and f