--what must she do now? It seemed to me that I had sunk so far
beneath her that it would take years to get back. It didn't seem worth
while making any plea for myself. You see, I was young and had serious
streaks all through me. So when she told me that she had written home
again, and was going back--was going to leave me, I didn't see that
it was only a bluff. I didn't see that she was really only waiting to
forgive me, if I gave her a chance. I started downtown to the building
and loan office, wondering when she would leave, and if there was
anything I could do to make her change her mind. I must repeat again
that I was a fool--that I needed only to speak one word, had I but known
it.

"If I had gone straight to work, everything might have come around all
right even then. But I didn't. I had that what's-the-use feeling. And I
stopped in at the Palmer House bar to get something to sort of pull me
together.

"While I was there, who should come up to the bar and order a drink but
Prent McMakin."

"Yes!" says Colonel Tom, as near excited as he ever got.

"Yes," says Armstrong, "nobody else. We saw each other in the mirror
behind the bar. I don't know whether you ever noticed it or not, Tom,
but McMakin's eyes had a way of looking almost like cross-eyes when he
was startled or excited. They were a good deal too near together at any
time. He gave me such a look when our eyes met in the mirror that, for
an instant, I thought that he intended to do me some mischief--shoot me,
you know, for taking his bride-to-be away from him, or some fool thing
like that. But as we turned toward each other I saw he had no intention
of that sort."

"Hadn't he?" says Colonel Tom, mighty interested.

"No," says the doctor, looking at Colonel Tom very puzzled, "did you
think he had?"

"Yes, I did," says the colonel, right thoughtful.

"On the contrary," says Armstrong, "we had a drink together. And he
congratulated me. Made me quite a little speech, in fact; one of the
flowery kind, you know, Tom, and said that he bore me no rancour, and
all that."

"The deuce he did!" says Colonel Tom, very low, like he was talking to
himself. "And then what?"

"Then," says the doctor, "then--let me see--it's all a long time ago,
you know, and McMakin's part in the whole thing isn't really important."

"I'm not so sure it isn't important," says the colonel, "but go on."

"Then," says Armstrong, "we had another drink together. In fact, a
lot of t