rn New Yorker it would brace me up
a whole lot."

It was one dull evening, under this cloud that enveloped Ben. We didn't
even go to a show, but turned in early. Lon Price sent a picture card of
the Flatiron Building to Henrietta telling her he was having a dreary
time and he was now glad he'd been disappointed about her not coming, so
love and kisses from her lonesome boy. It was what he would of sent her
anyway, but it happened to be the truth so far.

Well, I got the long night's rest that was coming to me and started out
early in the A.M. to pit my cunning against the wiles of the New York
department stores, having had my evil desires inflamed the day before by
an afternoon gown in chiffon velvet and Georgette crepe with silver
embroidery and fur trimming that I'd seen in a window marked down to
$198.98. I fell for that all right, and for an all-silk jersey sport
suit at $29.98 and a demi-tailored walking suit for a mere bagatelle,
and a white corduroy sport blouse and a couple of imported evening
gowns they robbed me on--but I didn't mind. You expect to be robbed for
anything really good in New York, only the imitation stuff that's worn
by the idle poor being cheaper than elsewhere. And I was so busy in this
whirl of extortion that I forgot all about the boys and their troubles
till I got back to the hotel at five o'clock.

I find 'em in the palm grill, or whatever it's called, drinking
stingers. But now they was not only more cheerful than they had been the
night before but they was getting a little bit contemptuous and Western
about the great city. Lon had met a brother real estate shark from Salt
Lake and Jeff had fell in with a sheep man from Laramie--and treated him
like an equal because of meeting him so far from home in a strange town
where no one would find it out on him--and Ben Sutton had met up with
his old friend Jake Berger, also from Nome. That's one nice thing about
New York; you keep meeting people from out your way that are lonesome,
too. Lon's friend and Jeff's sheep man had had to leave, being
encumbered by watchful-waiting wives that were having 'em paged every
three minutes and wouldn't believe the boy when he said they was out.
But Ben's friend, Jake Berger, was still at the table. Jake is a good
soul, kind of a short, round, silent man, never opening his head for any
length of time. He seems to bring the silence of the frozen North down
with him except for brief words to the waiter ever and