was anything strange in
the remark, or that he sat there because it dulled the heavy ache that
had been his since yesterday--the ache of finding what he had sought,
and finding with it disillusionment.

Till hunger drove him away he stayed, and his dreams were of the wide
land he had left. When he again walked down Pacific Avenue the hall
clock struck four, and after he had eaten he looked up at it and saw
that it lacked but fifteen minutes of five.

"I'm supposed to meet her when she quits work," he remembered, "and
Lola and Freddie will go to the plunge with us." He stopped and stared
in at the window of a curio store. "Say, that's a dandy Navajo
blanket," he murmured. "It would be out-uh-sight for a saddle
blanket." He started on, hesitated and went back. "I've got time
enough to get it," he explained to himself. He went in, bought the
blanket and two Mexican _serapes_ that caught his fancy, tucked the
bundle under his arm and started down the street toward the office
where Mary worked. It was just two minutes _to five_.

He got almost to the door--so near that his toe struck against a
corner of the belabelled bulletin board--when a sudden revulsion swept
his desires back like a huge wave. He stood a second irresolutely and
then turned back. "Aw--hell! What's the use?" he muttered.

The clock was just on the last stroke of five when he went up to the
clerk in his hotel. "Say, when does the next train pull out?--I don't
give a darn in what direction," he wanted to know. When the clerk told
him seven-thirty, he grinned and became undignifiedly loquacious.

"I want to show yuh a couple of dandy _serapes_ I just glommed, down
street," he said, and rolled the bundle open upon the desk. "Ain't
they a couple uh beauts? I got 'em for two uh my friends; they done me
a big favor, a month or two ago, and I wanted to kinda square the
deal. That's why I got 'em just alike. Yes, you bet they're peaches;
yuh can't get 'em like this in Montana. The boys'll sure appreciate
'em." He retied the bundle, took his room-key from the hand of the
smiling clerk and started up the stairway, humming a tune under his
breath as he went.

At the first turn he stopped and looked back. "Send the bell-hop up to
wake me at seven," he called down to the clerk. "I'm going to take a
much-needed nap--and it'll be all your life's worth to let me miss
that train!"

* * * * *

LORDS OF THE POTS AND PANS

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