ood a huge all-night lunch wagon. She moved toward it, for
she suddenly felt hungry. It was drawn to the curb; a short
flight of ladder steps led to an interior attractive to sight
and smell. She halted at the foot of the steps and looked in.
The only occupant was the man in charge. In a white coat he
was leaning upon the counter, reading a newspaper which lay
flat upon it. His bent head was extensively and roughly
thatched with black hair so thick that to draw a comb through
it would have been all but impossible. As Susan let down her
umbrella and began to ascend, he lifted his head and gave her
a full view of a humorous young face, bushy of eyebrows and
mustache and darkly stained by his beard, close shaven though
it was. He looked like a Spaniard or an Italian, but he was a
black Irishman, one of the West coasters who recall in their
eyes and coloring the wrecking of the Armada.

"Good morning, lady," said he. "Breakfast or supper?"

"Both," replied Susan. "I'm starved."

The air was gratefully warm in the little restaurant on wheels.
The dominant odor was of hot coffee; but that aroma was carried
to a still higher delight by a suggestion of pastry. "The best
thing I've got," said the restaurant man, "is hot corn beef
hash. It's so good I hate to let any of it go. You can have
griddle cakes, too--and coffee, of course."

"Very well," said Susan.

She was ascending upon a wave of reaction from the events of
the night. Her headache had gone. The rain beating upon the
roof seemed musical to her now, in this warm shelter with its
certainty of the food she craved.

The young man was busy at the shiny, compact stove; the odors
of the good things she was presently to have grew stronger and
stronger, stimulating her hunger, bringing joy to her heart and
a smile to her eyes. She wondered at herself. After what she
had passed through, how could she feel thus happy--yes,
positively happy? It seemed to her this was an indication of
a lack in her somewhere--of seriousness, of sensibility, of she
knew not what. She ought to be ashamed of that lack. But she
was not ashamed. She was shedding her troubles like a
child--or like a philosopher.

"Do you like hash?" inquired the restaurant man over his shoulder.

"Just as you're making it," said she. "Dry but not too dry.
Brown but not too brown."

"You don't think you'd like a poached egg on top of it?"

"Exactly what I want!"

"It isn't everybody t