first that don't make any impression at all. Then all of a sudden she
sits up and gazes vague over the top of my head.

"There's the Baron!" says she.

"The which?" says I.

"Von Blatzer," says she. "Oh, he's a real Baron, all right; an
odd-looking, dried up little chap with a wig and painted eyebrows. Yet
he's hardly sixty. I got to know him at Atlantic City, where I had a
Board Walk pitch one season. Queer? That's no word for it! Shy and
lonesome he was; but after you got to know him, one of the brightest,
jolliest old duffers. Our first talk was out on the end of one of those
long piers, by moonlight.

"After that it was a regular thing. We'd walk up and down like two kids,
telling each other all about ourselves. I'd never stated my full opinion
of Fletcher Shaw to a soul before; but somehow old Von was so friendly
and sympathetic that I cut loose. The Baron ground his teeth over it. He
said that Fletcher should have been caught young and shot from a cannon.
Good old Von Blatzer! Wanted me to go back to Vienna as the Baroness.
Think of it--me! But I was having a good season. Besides, I didn't think
I could stand for a wig. I didn't know how much I was going to miss
him."

"You wouldn't shy at the wig now, eh?" says I.

"Would I?" says she. "Honest, I liked Von Blatzer, for all his freaky
ways. He was human, he was, and we understood each other. He'll be at
Monte Carlo now. Roulette, you know. That's all he lives for. Plays a
system. Nice little income he has; not big, but comfortable. And during
the season he feeds it all into the wheel. Someone ought to cure him of
that."

"Think you could, I expect?" says I. "But how about you and the juniper
juice?"

"Oh, I could quit that easy if there was anything else to do," says she.
"But there isn't."

"Then here's a proposition," says I. "You query him by cable to see if
he's changed his mind; and if he's still a candidate for
matrimony--well, I guess Mr. Steele will see that you get to the Baron."

"You--you mean that?" says she gaspy.

"Uh-huh," says I. "It's up to you."

"But--but I---- Why, look at me!" says she.

"Two weeks on the water wagon, a few visits to the beauty parlors, and
an outfit of tango skirts ought to make some diff'rence, hadn't it?"
says I. "Those items would be included. What do you say?"

I expect it was a good deal of a proposition to spring on a female
party. No wonder she choked up over it.

"If I thought you were just guying