fished in his pocket for a nickel. And just when he was reaching up
from the step where he stood clinging--reaching over the flower-piled
hat of a girl, to place the nickel in the outstretched palm of the
conductor, he heard for the first time in many weeks the name of Mary
Johnson. A girl at his elbow was asking the other: "What'n the world's
become of Mary Johnson? She wasn't to the dance last night, and it's
the first one--"

Andy held his breath.

"Oh, Mame quit her place with Kelly and Gray, two weeks ago. She's
gone to Santa Cruz and got a place for the summer. Her and Lola
Parsons went together, and--"

Andy took advantage of another crossing, and dropped off. He wanted to
find out when the next train left for Santa Cruz. It never occurred to
him that there might be two Mary Johnsons in the world, which was
fortunate, perhaps; he wasted no time in hesitation, and so, within
twenty minutes, he was hearing the wheels of a fast train go
_clickety-click, clickety-click_ over the switches in the suburbs of
San Jose, and he was asking the conductor what time the train would
reach Santa Cruz, and was getting snubbed for his anxiety.

Santa Cruz, when he did reach it, seemed, on a superficial
examination, to be almost as large as San Jose, and the real-estate
offices closer together and even more plentifully supplied with modern
cottages and bath--and the heart of him sank prophetically. For the
first time since he dropped off the street-car in San Jose, it seemed
to him that Mary Johnson was quite as far off, quite as unattainable
as she had ever been.

He walked slowly up Pacific Avenue and watched the hurrying crowds,
and wondered if chance would be kind to him; if he should meet her on
the street, perhaps. He did not want to canvass all the real-estate
offices in town. "It would take me till snow flies," he murmured
dispiritedly, forgetting that here was a place where snow never flew,
and sought a hotel where they were not "full to the eaves" as two
complacent clerks had already told him.

At supper, he made friends with a genial-voiced insurance agent--the
kind who does not insist upon insuring your life whether you want it
insured or not. The agent told Andy to call him Jack and use him good
and plenty--perhaps because something wistful and lonely in the gray
eyes of Andy appealed to him--and Andy took him at his word and was
grateful. He discovered what day of the week it was: Saturday, and
that on the ne