me." Then, as he
made a motion toward the push-button, which would summon the secretary:
"No, don't do that! Wait a minute!" From her bag she drew her business
card, presented it. "Read that first."

Senor Pages read it. He looked up. Then he read it again. He gazed
again at Emma McChesney. Emma McChesney looked straight at him and
tried in vain to remember ever having heard of the South American's
sense of humor. A moment passed. Her heart sank. Then Senor Pages
threw back his fine head and laughed--laughed as the Latin laughs,
emphasizing his mirth with many ejaculations and gestures.

"Ah, you Northerners! You are too quick for us. Come; I myself must
see this garment which you honor by selling." His glance rested
approvingly on Emma McChesney's trim, smart figure. "That which you
sell, it must be quite right."

"I not only sell it," said Emma McChesney; "I wear it."

"That--how is it you Northerners say?--ah, yes--that settles it!"

Six weeks later, in his hotel room in Columbus, Ohio, T. A. Buck sat
reading a letter forwarded from New York and postmarked Argentina. As
he read he chuckled, grew serious, chuckled again and allowed his cigar
to grow cold.

For the seventh time:

DEAR T. A.:

They've fallen for Featherlooms the way an Eskimo takes to gum-drops.
My letter of credit is all shot to pieces, but it was worth it. They
make you pay a separate license fee in each province, and South America
is just one darn province after another. If they'd lump a peddler's
license for $5,000 and tell you to go ahead, it would be cheaper.

I landed Pages y Hernandez by a trick. The best of it is the man I
played it on saw the point and laughed with me. We North Americans
brag too much about our sense of humor.

I thought ten years on the road had hardened me to the most fiendish
efforts of a hotel chef. But the food at the Grande here makes a
quarter-inch round steak with German fried look like Sherry's latest
triumph. You know I'm not fussy. I'm the kind of woman who, given her
choice of ice cream or cheese for dessert, will take cheese. Here,
given my choice, I play safe and take neither. I've reached the point
where I make a meal of radishes. They kill their beef in the morning
and serve it for lunch. It looks and tastes like an Ethiop's ear. But
I don't care, because I'm getting gorgeously thin.

If the radishes hold out I'll invade Central America and Panama. I've
one eye on Valparais