ld
follow--a glittering .44 appeared as if by some conjuring
trick in the right hand of Mr. Standifer, who, without
a perceptible movement of his arm, shot Benton Sharp
through the heart. It seems that the new Commissioner of
Insurance, Statistics, and History has been an old-time
Indian fighter and ranger for many years, which accounts
for the happy knack he has of handling a .44.

It is not believed that Mr. Standifer will be put to any
inconvenience beyond a necessary formal hearing to-day,
as all the witnesses who were present unite in declaring
that the deed was done in self-defence.

When Mrs. Sharp appeared at the office of the commissioner,
according to appointment, she found that gentleman calmly eating
a golden russet apple. He greeted her without embarrassment and
without hesitation at approaching the subject that was the topic
of the day.

"I had to do it, ma'am," he said, simply, "or get it myself. Mr.
Kauffman," he added, turning to the old clerk, "please look up the
records of the Security Life Insurance Company and see if they are
all right."

"No need to look," grunted Kauffman, who had everything in his head.
"It's all O.K. They pay all losses within ten days."

Mrs. Sharp soon rose to depart. She had arranged to remain in town
until the policy was paid. The commissioner did not detain her. She
was a woman, and he did not know just what to say to her at present.
Rest and time would bring her what she needed.

But, as she was leaving, Luke Standifer indulged himself in an
official remark:

"The Department of Insurance, Statistics, and History, ma'am, has
done the best it could with your case. 'Twas a case hard to cover
according to red tape. Statistics failed, and History missed fire,
but, if I may be permitted to say it, we came out particularly
strong on Insurance."

XVII

THE RENAISSANCE AT CHARLEROI

Grandemont Charles was a little Creole gentleman, aged thirty-four,
with a bald spot on the top of his head and the manners of a prince.
By day he was a clerk in a cotton broker's office in one of those
cold, rancid mountains of oozy brick, down near the levee in New
Orleans. By night, in his three-story-high _chambre garnier_ in the
old French Quarter he was again the last male descendant of the
Charles family, that noble house that had lorded it in France, and
had pushed its way smiling, rapiered, and courtly into Louisiana's
early and brilli