d sought the calm of the white and gold passenger
saloon. Here they trod as in the very sanctities of luxury.

"These carpets is nice, ain't they?" remarked Mrs. Bean.

Then alluding to the scene they had just left: "Ain't it comical how she
idolizes that there bird?"

Mrs. Tinneray sniffed. "And what she spends on him! 'Nitials on his
seed-cup--and some says the cage itself is true gold."

Mrs. Bean, preparing to wash her hands, removed her black skirt and
pinned a towel around her waist. "This here liquid soap is
nice"--turning the faucets gingerly--"and don't the boat set good onto
the water?" Then returning to the rich topic of Mrs. Tuttle and her
pampered bird, "Where's she get all her money for her ottermobile and
her gold cage?"

Mrs. Tinneray at an adjacent basin raised her head sharply, "You ain't
heard about the Tuttle money? You don't know how Mabel Hutch that was,
was hair to everything?"

Mrs. Bean confessed that she had not heard, but she made it evident that
she thirsted for information. So the two ladies, exchanging remarks
about sunburn and freckles, finished their hand-washing and proceeded to
the dark-green plush seats of the saloon, where with appropriate looks
of horror and incredulity Mrs. Bean listened to the story of the hairs
to the Hutches' money.

"Mabel was the favorite; her Pa set great store by her. There was
another sister--consumpted--she should have been a hair, but she died.
Then the youngest one, Hetty, she married my second cousin Hen
Cronney--well it seemed like they hadn't nothing but bad luck and her Pa
and Mabel sort of took against Hetty."

Mrs. Bean, herself chewing calculatingly, handed Mrs. Tinneray a bit of
sugared calamus-root.

"Is your cousin Hen dark-complexioned like your folks?" she asked
scientifically.

Mrs. Tinneray, narrowing both eyes, considered. "More auburn-inclined, I
should say--he ain't rill smart, Hen ain't, he gets took with spells now
and then, but I never held _that_ against him."

"Uh-huh!" agreed Mrs. Bean sympathetically.

"Well, then, Mabel Hutch and her Popper took against poor little Hetty.
Old man Hutch he died and left everything to Mabel, and she never goes
near her own sister!"

Mrs. Bean raised gray-cotton gloved hands signifying horror.

"St--st--st----!" she deplored. She searched in her reticule for more
calamus-root. "He didn't leave her _nothing_?"

"No, ma'am! This one!" With a jerk of the head, Mrs. Tinneray indicated