hat the newspapers had made
famous.

"Now look with all your eyes," cried the driver, suddenly. "Here's Mrs.
Johnny Belhaven. She's worth more millions than all the rest put
together, and is an A1 whip."

A plump but distinguished-looking woman bore down on them in what
appeared to be a chariot. Andrew had never seen anything so high on
wheels before. Mrs. Belhaven looked down upon her "Order" as from a
throne, and wore a slightly supercilious expression.

"And there's Ward McAllister," continued the driver, excitedly; "him as
is the leader of the Four Hundred, you know."

Andrew almost raised himself from his seat. He stared with bulging eyes
at the tired carelessly dressed elderly man with whom he had been
intimate so many years.

He returned to the hotel. His spirits were normal again. He had taken
his part in a fragment of the daily life of Newport. As he passed
through the office on his way to the elevator, the clerk beckoned to
him.

"As you seem a stranger, sir," he said, apologetically, "I thought I
would introduce you to Mr. Chapman. He's the correspondent of several
New York papers, and could tell you how to amuse yourself."

A short thick-set amiable young man shook Andrew's hand heartily. Mr.
Chapman was not the sort of person Andrew had gone to Newport to meet,
but he was glad of any friendship, temporarily.

The two young men went out to the veranda. Andrew proffered his new
cigar-case. The other accepted gratefully. He was the free-lance
correspondent of several New York weekly papers, and his salary was not
large. He tipped his chair back, put his feet on the railing, and
confided to Webb that he hated Newport.

"I wouldn't have come here this summer if I could have got out of it,"
he said, gloomily. "It's my third year, and the place gets worse every
season. These people are so stuck-up there's no approaching them for
news. Even Lancaster, who has a sort of _entree_ because he is connected
with a swagger family, admits that it's as much as his life is worth to
get anything out of them. He's the correspondent of the New York _Eye_.
What's worse, they don't do anything. Here it is the third of August,
and not a ball has been given--just little things among themselves that
you can't get at. It's enough to drive a fellow to drink. I've faked
till my poor imagination is worn to a thread; the papers have to have
news. But I've done one big thing this summer,--a corking beat. Did you
notice half-wa