ow nice of him!" commented his wife.

"Servants never remember me, yet I always fee better than you do,"
complained Bee.

"Console yourself. It is only porters and head waiters who care whether
I am happy or not," I said, bitterly.

"Deary me!" said Jimmie, sitting up. "Come, let's get out of this. We
must walk her over where she'll hear some music and see some pretty
lights or she'll drown herself in her bath to-morrow."

We went, we promenaded, we showed our clothes, and came home smirking
with satisfaction. We had been pointed out everywhere for Americans,
which spoke volumes for our clothes and the smallness of our feet.

During two mortal weeks we stayed at Baden-Baden, taking the baths,
improving our German and driving through the Black Forest and the Oos
Valley to the green hills beyond.

Then on one happy day we were all packed to go. We sent our trunks
down, saw every drawer emptied, pulled the bed to pieces, looked under
it and decided that _this_ time we hadn't left so much as a pin. Bee
stuck her "_blaue cravatte_," as we now called the necktie, under the
bureau mat to put on when we came up, and then we snatched a hasty
luncheon. In the meantime we turned our "private maid" and the
chambermaid loose to see if we had overlooked anything.

When we came up they were still rummaging, but had found nothing.

Bee hurried to the bureau and looked under the mat. No tie. She asked
the two women. They had not seen it. Then everybody hunted. Jimmie swore
we had packed it. But Bee's gray eyes turned to green as she watched the
flurried movements of the two maids. She walked up to them.

"Give me that blue necktie," she said, in awful German.

At that Jimmie, who hates a row when it is not of his own making,
interfered and insisted that we must have packed it--he remembered
numbers of times when we had made a fuss over nothing--it was of no
account anyway, and if we would only come along and not miss the train
he would send back to Charvet and get Bee another "_blaue cravatte_."

"For heaven's sake, take that man downstairs," I said to Mrs. Jimmie,
"and let us manage this affair."

So poor Jimmie was whisked from the scene of action, still protesting
and gesticulating, and being soothed but marched steadily onward by his
wife.

When we came down we were heated but unsuccessful. I insisted upon
reporting the affair to my friend the head waiter. He almost went back
on his devotion to me in his assurances th